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Biomaterials are used on wounds as a dressing material to prevent the infection and to heal the wounds. In this present study, pure bamboo fabric has been selected for construction of functional part of bandage, coated with natural herbs such as Azadirachta indica, Centella asiatica, and Curcuma longa by microcapsules and exhaustion method. The binding of extracts to the fabric was confirmed through FTIR and FESEM analysis at 1 µm magnification. The air-permeability of the fabricate samples shows 100 cm3/cm2/s and the bursting strength was found to be 5.5 kg/cm2. The extension at break and recover of fabricated material was 101% and 24% respectively. The extract coated fabric expressed good water contact angle (50.51°–58.69°) and swelling property of about 337–320% at 10 mg/ml extract concentration. All fabrics exhibited good antibacterial activity against Staphylococcus aureus, Escherichia coli and Bacillus subtilis, the major microbes present in the wounds. The prepared dressing material had shown only 20% degradation against lysozyme enzyme with no allergic reactions. Furthermore, wound healing ability of BFC-Cl, BFC-Ai and BFC-Ca were tested on Albino Wistar rats and found that extracts coated fabric took 15 days for complete healing of wound.

Cobalt is an essential trace metal and plays a pivotal role in the growth of all living organisms. The exposure of cobalt in the aquatic environment is ubiquitous via both natural and anthropogenic activities. The present study was carried out to investigate the accumulation response of macrophyte Hydrilla verticillata (L.f.) Royle towards the cobalt exposure at different concentrations (1, 25, 50, 75 and 100 µM) for seven days. The results showed that the cobalt accumulation increased in treated H. verticillata (L.f.) Royle with increase in concentration. The Bioconcentration factor (BCF) values were high in plants exposed to higher concentration of cobalt. Increase in growth (shoot length) and pigments (chlorophyll a, b and total chlorophyll) were detected at 25 µM cobalt concentration, whereas the growth and pigments were declined in 50, 75 and 100 µM. There was no significant difference in the carotenoid content between control and treated plant. Antioxidant enzymes (superoxide dismutase, catalase, and peroxidase) were increased at higher concentrations of cobalt. The results indicated that the decline in growth and pigments, and an increase in antioxidant enzyme activities, were triggered by the accumulation of cobalt in the plant. These observations suggest that H. verticillata (L.f.) Royle is well equipped to accumulate low concentration of cobalt in tissues to increase its growth and detoxify ROS generation. The BCF results indicate the efficiency of using H. verticillata (L.f.) Royle as a phytostabilizer.

The present study deals with the synthesis of silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) from Rhynchosia rufescens and to evaluate its cytotoxic effect mediated through induced apoptosis. The reduction and capping of phytoconstituents was confirmed using FTIR demonstrating O-H and C-H stretching at different peaks. The size and the shape of the particle were determined using scanning electron microscopy (SEM) illustrating 1 μm to 100 nm in size and the composition of compounds in the AgNPs were revealed using XRD and EDX. The results of the antioxidant assays revealed that the synthesized AgNPs had significant radical scavenging potential in dose-dependent inhibition with 22-64% for DPPH and 25-41% for ferric reducing antioxidant power assay at the concentrations of 20-100 μg/ml. Further, the synthesized AgNPs demonstrated potent cytotoxic activity against human breast cancer (MCF-7) cell line with an IC50 value of 26 ± 1.0 μg/ml by the MTT assay. Cytotoxicity was confirmed using AO/EtBr and DAPI staining method where nuclear condensation and fragmentation of cancer cells was observed after treatment with nanoparticle. The results were further confirmed by flow cytometry analysis which revealed the occurrence of apoptosis during the S phase in cell cycle exposing the potential of the AgNPs against MCF-7 cancer cell. From the results, we conclude that the synthesized AgNPs from Rhynchosia rufescens exhibited multifunctional properties. Graphical abstract.