Anti-inflammatory copper nanoparticles for wound medication

Abstract

Nanoparticles have received a lot of attention in recent years as a precise and sensitive tool for a variety of applications, including electronic device manufacturing and medical treatments. They played an essential role as a linkage between the atomic or molecular structure and the bulk material, exhibiting new characteristics depending on specific features such as size, shape distribution, capping agent, ionic strength, and morphology. The aim of this work is to investigate the anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties of biosynthesized copper nanoparticles Cu-NPs in comparison to veterinary drugs as a wound medication in fish skin tissue. A total of 40 fish were collected from Babil Governorate Market and then divided into two groups: 10 as a control group and 30 as an investigating group to make them sick. Later, 30 fish were punched within a syringe and left to get sick for two weeks in a separate water tank. After getting them sick, 10 were treated with Cu-NPs, and another 10 were supplemented with Fungus Guard as a veterinary drug, while the last 10 were left without treatment. The activity of enzymatic antioxidants in fish skin tissue has been used to identify the effect of Cu-NPs in comparison with veterinary drugs as anti-inflammatory agents. After the treatment time, it was discovered that the fish treated with Cu-NPs had significantly improvement in their health than the untreated fish with no signs of infection. The results show that the levels of antioxidant enzyme including SOD, CAT, and GPx increased significantly in infected skin tissue from (0.0241 ± 0.0025, 0.0237 ± 0.0049, and 0.0560 ± 0.0096 U/mg) to (0.1136 ± 0.0049, 0.0638 ± 0.0034, and 0.1174 ± 0.0019 U/mg respectively), after using CuNPs as a medication for two weeks with no sign of illness. We can conclude that Cu-NPs act as antioxidants to prevent the oxidative damage due to skin infection.