Nano MOFs as targeted drug delivery agents to combat antibiotic resistant bacterial infections

The drug resistance of bacteria is a significant threat to human civilization while the action of antibiotics against drug-resistant bacteria is severely limited due to the hydrophobic nature of drug molecules, which unquestionably inhibit its permanency for clinical applications. The antibacterial action of nanomaterials offers major modalities to combat drug resistance of bacteria. The current work reports, the use of nano MOFs encapsulating drug molecules to enhance its antibacterial activity against model drug-resistant free living bacteria and biofilm of the bacteria. We have attached rifampicin (RF), a well-documented antituberculosis drug with tremendous pharmacological significance, into the pore surface of zeolitic imidazolate framework 8 (ZIF8) by a simple synthetic procedure. The synthesized ZIF8 has been characterized using X-ray diffraction (XRD) method before and after drug encapsulation. The electron microscopic strategies such as scanning electron microscope (SEM) and tr...