Fungal biosynthesis of gold nanoparticles: mechanism and scale up

Summary Gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) are a widespread research tool because of their oxidation resistance, biocompatibility and stability. Chemical methods for AuNP synthesis often produce toxic residues that raise environmental concern. On the other hand, the biological synthesis of AuNPs in viable m...

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Published inMicrobial biotechnology Vol. 8; no. 6; pp. 904 - 917
Main Authors Kitching, Michael, Ramani, Meghana, Marsili, Enrico
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published United States John Wiley & Sons, Ltd 01.11.2015
Subjects
Bioreactors
Biotechnology - methods
Fungi - metabolism
Gold - metabolism
Minireview
Nanoparticles - metabolism
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Summary:Summary Gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) are a widespread research tool because of their oxidation resistance, biocompatibility and stability. Chemical methods for AuNP synthesis often produce toxic residues that raise environmental concern. On the other hand, the biological synthesis of AuNPs in viable microorganisms and their cell‐free extracts is an environmentally friendly and low‐cost process. In general, fungi tolerate higher metal concentrations than bacteria and secrete abundant extracellular redox proteins to reduce soluble metal ions to their insoluble form and eventually to nanocrystals. Fungi harbour untapped biological diversity and may provide novel metal reductases for metal detoxification and bioreduction. A thorough understanding of the biosynthetic mechanism of AuNPs in fungi is needed to reduce the time of biosynthesis and to scale up the AuNP production process. In this review, we describe the known mechanisms for AuNP biosynthesis in viable fungi and fungal protein extracts and discuss the most suitable bioreactors for industrial AuNP biosynthesis. Recent studies on AuNPs biosynthesis in fungi are comprehensively reviewed.The mechanisms of AuNPs biosynthesis in fungal biomass and cell‐free extracts are critically discussedBioreactors configurations and method for scale‐up of AuNP biosynthesis are proposed
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Funding Information Michael Kitching was funded by the Irish Research Council (Embark Initiative).
ISSN:1751-7915
1751-7915
DOI:10.1111/1751-7915.12151