Electrospun soy-protein-based nanofibrous membranes for effective

antimicrobial air filtration

Zhicheng Jiang,1 Heyang Zhang,2 Miaomiao Zhu,1 Dan Lv,1 Jianfeng Yao,1 Ranhua Xiong,2
Chaobo Huang 1
1
College of Chemical Engineering, Jiangsu Key Lab of Biomass-based Green Fuels and Chemicals, Nanjing Forestry University,
Nanjing 210037, People’s Republic of China
2
Lab General Biochemistry & Physical Pharmacy, Faculty of Pharmaceutics, Ghent University, Ghent B9000, Belgium
Correspondence to: C. Huang (E - mail: huangchaobo@njfu.edu.cn) and R. Xiong (E - mail: ranhua.xiong@gmail.com)

ABSTRACT: Soy proteins are gaining more and more attention because of its multifunction and biodegradability. Silver nanoparticles
(AgNPs) are introduced into the nanofibers to prevent growth of microorganisms over the filter media. In the present study, the mul-
tifunctional and antimicrobial nanofibrous membranes were prepared by electrospinning the soy protein isolate (SPI)/polymide-6
(PA6)-silver nitrate system followed by ultraviolet reduction. The morphology of SPI/PA6 nanofibrous membranes was characterized
by scanning electron microscopy. Antibacterial property of nanofibrous membranes were investigated against Escherichia coli and
Bacillus subtilis. The optimized fiber membrane exhibited over 95% filtration efficiency of PM0.3 (particulate matter size less than 0.3
lm). The successful synthesis of SPI/PA6-AgNPs nanofibrous membranes would make it to be the potential candidate for novel anti-
bacterial and high-performance air filter. V
C 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2017, 134, 45766.

KEYWORDS: applications; membranes; oil and gas

Received 3 July 2017; accepted 5 September 2017

DOI: 10.1002/app.45766

INTRODUCTION diameter determines a higher interception efficiency for submi-

In recent years, air pollution has been a growing concern, as it
severely affected people’s daily life due to the complicated com-
position of pollutants. Taking the particulate matter (PM) 2.5
mm as an example, it includes solid and liquid particles emitted
into the air, such as road and agricultural dust, automobile
exhaust, bacteria/viruses, originated from human activities like
traffic, industry, power plans, etc.1–3 PM affects the living envi-
ronments in terms of air quality, visibility, radiative forcing, cli-
mate, and ecosystems.1 In particular, PM2.5 is harmful to
human health since its size is small enough to penetrate the
human lungs and then permeate through the body circulation
system. Long-term exposure to PM pollution leads to heart dis-
ease, lung disease, and strokes, even cancer, while short-term
exposure to high concentration of PM probably causes disease
like asthma attacks.4
Considering the seriousness of the pollution, it is urgent to
adopt effective safeguard to protect human from hazy days, like
mask filters, air filters, etc.4 Conventional filter materials (such
as glass fibers, spun-bonded fibers, and melt-blown fibers) often
show a lower intercept efficiency for micro-particles especially
PM2.5 due to the fairly large pores size of micrometer-scale
fibers. It is well established that the fiber medium with a smaller
cron particles and bacteria.5,6 Compared with traditional filter
materials, nanofibers are considered to be the promising and
feasible candidate in the field of air filter because of their nano-
sized diameter, large surface areas, and the higher ratio of length
to diameter.5,7,8 The nanofibers used as air filters exhibit many
superiorities such as excellent PM removal efficiency and low
filtration resistance, which benefits from their relatively small
pore diameters and high porosity.3,9,10
The advanced nanofibrous membranes, prepared by the novel elec-
trospinning technique with the optimized parameters, exhibit ultra-
thin and ultrafine fiber diameter (40–2000 nm),6,11,12 large specific
surface area, extensively internal connectivity, adjustable networks
and porosity, controllable morphology of nanofibrous membranes,
and easy-to-scalable fabrication from a variety of source materi-
als.13–17 These advantages not only ensure that it has an amazing
comprehensive-performance (i.e., efficient interception for PM2.5
and low filtration resistance), but also provide a low-cost method of
preparing highly controllable filter materials.6,18 Therefore, the poly-
mers, including polyurethane (PU),19 poly(vinyl chloride)–PU,20
polyacrylonitrile,21–23 polysultone,24 poly(vinyl alcohol),25 poly(eth-
ylene terephthalate),26 and polymide-66,27 have been successfully
electrospun to prepare nanofibers as filter materials. Moreover,

C 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

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nanofibers composed of two or more materials demonstrate specific
filtration and the comprehensive application of nanofibrous mem-
branes. However, the unsuitable fiber diameter and dense structure
of nanofibrous membranes assembly still have not reached to the
satisfactory level of capture efficiency and airflow resistance for fine
particles, which not only clog up filters reducing the filter working-
life but cause more expenditure of energy.13,28
As a novel bio-based air filtering material, soy protein isolate
(SPI) has been extensively investigated.29 Soy protein is one of
the most abundant and low-cost plant protein and contains a
large number of ionizable groups in the main chain resulting
that soy proteins can undergo deprotonation of acidic and basic
groups under acidic solvent conditions, i.e., carboxyl group into
carboxylate anion (RACOOH to RACOO–) and amine groups
converted to amino groups (RANH1 3 to RANH2), which
increases the active sites of trapping contaminants and fine par-
ticles. These unique properties make soy protein a very attrac-
tive material.30 It has been widely investigated as biomaterial
with numerous applications,2 including adhesives,31 plastic
products,32 fiber textiles,33 antimicrobial agents,30 drug deliv-
ery,34 and tissue regeneration materials.35 In this study, soy pro-
tein was first denatured and silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) were
added to the multifunctional filter media with the help of
polymide-6 (PA6) by electrostatic spinning. The SP-based nano-
structured membranes show excellent effectiveness for both
chemical pollutants and fine particles, and the outstanding
property of antisepsis.
EXPERIMENTAL
Raw Materials
Soy protein powder (protein amount > 90%) was obtained
from Linyi Mountain Biological Products Co., Ltd., Shandong,
China. Powder of polymide-6 (60–90 meshes) was purchased
from Aladdin Chemical Co., Shanghai, China. Sliver nitrate was
supplied by Shanghai Chemical Reagent Co., Ltd., Nanjing,
China. Formic acid (88% purity) was supplied by Nanjing
Chemical Reagent Co., Ltd., Nanjing, China. Acetic acid
(99.5% purity) was purchased from Sinopharm Chemical
Reagent Co., Ltd., Shanghai, China. All chemicals and solvents
were used without further purification.
Preparation of SPI/PA6 Spinning Solution
SPI solution (10 wt %) was prepared by dissolving soy protein
powder in a mixed solvent (acetic acid/deionized water 5 40:10,
vol/vol) at 85 8C for 4 h using magnetic stirrer at 500 rpm. By
vigorous stirring at room temperature for 24 h, PA6 was dis-
solved in the formic acid with the final concentration of 45 wt
%. Finally, the SPI solution was added in various loading to
PA6 solution and then stirred for 12 h at room temperature to
prepare homogeneous SPI/PA6 solutions.
Preparation of SPI/PA6-AgNPs Spinning Solution
Sliver nitrate (AgNO3) solutions with various concentration of
0.1, 0.2, 0.3, 0.4, 0.5, and 0.6 wt % were prepared by using for-
mic acid with stirring for 2 h at room temperature. Then PA6-
AgNO3 solutions were prepared by dissolving PA6 in different
concentration of AgNO3 solutions. Then, the denatured SPI
solution was added into the PA6-AgNO3 solutions at different
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mass ratios under same condition as SPI/PA6 prepared to gain
SPI/PA6-AgNO3 solutions. More detailed information can be
found in Table I.
Fabrication of Nanofibrous Membranes by Electrospinning
Soy-protein-based nanostructured membranes were fabricated
by electrospinning technology. The SPI/PA6 and SPI/PA6-Ag
solutions were loaded into plastic syringes (1 mL) with a 23-
Guage blunt-tip needle which was applied at the voltage of 27–
28 kV for electrospinning (FM-1206 Electrostatic Textile Equip-
ment, Beijing Future Material Sci-tech Co., Ltd., Beijing,
China). The polymerization solutions were propelled in a
syringe at a spinning speed of 0.01 mm s21 to form a charged
jet, resulting in the deposition of nanofibers on the grounded
stainless roller after rapid solvent evaporation with polypropyl-
ene nonwoven substrate covered. The diameter of roller was
20 cm with a rotating speed of 50 rpm and the tip-to-collection
distance was 15 cm. Since the nanofibrous membranes were too
fragile to have sufficient mechanical strength for filtration test,
polypropylene nonwoven fabric with negligible filtration effi-
ciency and pressure drop were required as sub-layer to support
the nanofibrous membranes. The nanofibrous membranes were
dried at 60 8C in a vacuum oven (DZG-6020 Vacuum Oven,
Shanghai Senxin Experimental Instrument Co., Ltd, Shanghai,
China) for 12 h to remove the residual solvent and charges. All
electrospinning experiments were conducted with relevant tem-
perature of 25 6 2 8C and humidity at of 25% 6 2%, respec-
tively. Moreover, the volume of the electrospun polymer
solutions was carefully adjusted to achieve uniform fiber mats
with different areal density of SPI/PA6 nanofibrous membranes.
By using ultraviolet irradiation with emission wavelength at
254 nm for more than 6 h, nanofibrous membranes composed
of SPI/PA6-AgNO3 were reduced to SPI/PA6-Ag nanoparticles
(SPI/PA6-AgNPs) nanofibrous membranes.
Antibacterial Activity Testing
Antibacterial activity of SPI/PA6 and SPI/PA6-AgNPs nanofi-
brous membranes with different doping levels against a Gram-
positive bacterium Bacillus subtilis and a Gram-negative bacte-
rium E. coli was investigated by a liquid culture test. The SPI/
PA6 and SPI/PA6-AgNPs nanofibrous membranes were
immersed in the medium and incubated at 37 8C with an orbital
shaker at 200 rpm for 12 h. The optical density (OD) of the
medium was measured at 600 nm using a digital spectropho-
tometer. The decrease in absorbance was considered as the effect
Table I. Formulations of Different Concentration of AgNPs
Wt % PA6/AgNO3 SPI
Samples AgNPs AgNO3 (g) solution (g) solution (g)
N0 0 0 8 2
N1 0.1 0.0044 8 2
N2 0.2 0.0088 8 2
N3 0.3 0.0132 8 2
N4 0.4 0.0176 8 2
N5 0.5 0.0220 8 2
N6 0.6 0.0264 8 2
J. APPL. POLYM. SCI. 2017, DOI: 10.1002/APP.45766
ARTICLE WILEYONLINELIBRARY.COM/APP
of thin films against the bacterial growth. The bacterial inhibi-
tion36 by the thin films was calculated as follows:
% of bacterial inhibition
Absorbance of control2absorbance of sample
5
Absorbance of control
Characterization and Air-Filtration Testing
The morphology of SPI/PA6 nanofibrous membranes which
were dried in a vacuum oven at 110 8C for 5 h was examined by
utilizing scanning electron microscopy (SEM, S-4800, Hitachi
Ltd., Japan) after coated platinum for 120 s. The average diame-
ter of nanofibers was calculated and analyzed based on SEM
images of nanofibrous membranes with Image J software. Elec-
tronic balance (ME-104, Mettler-Toledo Group, Switzerland)
was made to measure the areal density of nanofibrous mem-
branes. To study the interface interactions between pollutants
and nanofibrous membranes, chemical structure of nanofibrous
membranes before and after cigarette-smoke PM particles filtra-
tion was characterized by Fourier transform infrared (FTIR)
spectroscopy.
The filtration efficiency and pressure drop at given filtration
media were comprehensively measured by LZC-K1 purchased
from Huada Instrument and Equipment Co. Ltd., Soochow,
China. The charge of neutralized NaCl aerosols with the size
ranging from 0.3 to 10 lm was generated by atomizing air
pump. The particles were pushed to pass through the testing
platform layered sample films with a valid test area of 12 3
12 cm2. Number of aerosol particles through the samples before
and after was counted by laser absorption. The filtration is cal-
culated by h 5 1 – N/N0, where N and N0 are the quantity of
NaCl aerosol at the downstream and upstream of the filter,
respectively. The decreased pressure drop (Dp) is detected
through electronic pressure transmitters. The quality factor
(QF) of the samples is critical to standard evaluation of filter
medium and can be calculated by the following formula2
Figure 1. SEM images of SPI/PA6 nanofibrous membranes with different SPI/PA6 mass ratios: (a) 1:9, (b) 2:8, (c) 3:7, (d) 4:6, (e) 5:5. Scale bar 5 1 mm.
45766 (3 of 8)
2ln ð12hÞ
QF5
Dp
The gas flow rate for the test was 32 mL/min. Therefore,
increasing efficiency with maintained low pressure drops will be
critical for improvement of the QF of air filters.
RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
Morphology and Structure of SPI/PA6 Nanofibrous
Membranes
Well-designed morphology of nanofibrous membranes could be
a great benefit to air filter possessing excellent and supreme air
fine particles filtration efficiency with ultra-low resistance. The
smaller the fiber diameter, causing porosity increased and the
pore size of nanofibrous membranes decreased, the higher the
filtration efficiency but the larger pressure drop. While, the
lower filtration efficiency and pressure drop are due to the big-
ger fiber diameter of nanofibrous membranes. Polymer concen-
tration, as one of the most critical parameters affecting
electrospun fibers’ morphology, provides a regulation strategy to
endow the membranes with large cavity by employing different
fiber diameters. As a typical technique for characterization of
fiber morphology, SEM was used to investigate the morphology
of the electrospun fiber mats of SPI/PA6 with mass ratio rang-
ing from 1:9 to 5:5. The representative SEM images of electro-
spun SPI/PA6 nanofibrous membranes with aforementioned
mass ratios are shown in Figure 1(a–e). With the decreased
amount of PA6 in SPI/PA6, the diameter of the electrospun
fiber was gradually reduced, which probably attributes to the
decreasing viscosity of point spinning fluid induced by gradual
decrease in viscosity of electrospun solutions. As observed from
the SEM images, the accumulation formed by the larger diame-
ter of fiber leads to the larger pore size which results in the
lower pressure drop, but lower filtration efficiency, vice versa.
J. APPL. POLYM. SCI. 2017, DOI: 10.1002/APP.45766
ARTICLE WILEYONLINELIBRARY.COM/APP
Ensuring the high filtration efficiency and the low pressure drop
is critical to excellent filter media.
The pore size and porosity of the nanofibrous membranes
which were directly affected by the diameter of fibers play a key
role in filtration efficiency and pressure drop. As mentioned
earlier, the fiber diameter is affected by the concentration of the
spinning solutions. Figure 2 shows the fiber diameter distribu-
tion. In Figure 2(b), the fiber diameter distribution and the
average fiber diameter (SPI/PA6 5 2:8) were optimal choice
because of the nanofibrous membranes with the highest filtra-
tion efficiency and the lowest pressure drop among all the SPI/
PA6 nanofibrous membranes, which would be clearly confirmed
in the following elaboration. And the average fiber diameter was
estimated according to the SEM images of randomly selected
100 fibers. When the mass ratio of SPI/PA6 were 1:9, 2:8, 3:7,
4:6, and 5:5, the corresponding average diameters of electrospun
fibers were 600, 450, 310, 260, and 225 nm, respectively.
Evaluation of the Air-Filtration Performance of Nanofibrous
Membranes
Removal of Particulate Pollutants.. To investigate the capabili-
ties of SPI/PA6 nanofibrous membranes, we evaluated the filtra-
tion performance by employing the multipath distribution of
sodium chloride (NaCl) aerosols with the size less than 300 nm
under designed airflow velocity at 32 L/min. In detail, first the
mass ratio of SPI/PA6 was optimized based on fiber morphol-
ogy and structure, as shown in Figure 1. Then the PM0.3 (as the
diameter of NaCl aerosol particles was less than 300 nm) filtra-
tion performance of these samples was tested (the areal density
of nanofibrous membranes were controlled to be 4.32 g/m2). As
presented in Figure 3(a,b), as the proportion of PA6 in the pre-
cursor decreased, the pressure drop of SPI/PA6 filter increased
significantly while the PM0.3 filtration efficiency increased and
reached to a plateau owing to the diameter of fiber decreasing
as the concentration of the spinning solutions decreasing. This
phenomenon can be more appropriately explained by the classi-
cal theory that cavity volume was inversely proportional to
Figure 2. Distribution of fiber size with different mass radio of SPI/PA6: (a) 1:9, (b) 2:8, (c) 3:7, (d) 4:6, (e) 5:5. [Color figure can be viewed at wileyon-
linelibrary.com]
45766 (4 of 8)
pressure drop. Further analysis indicated that, when spinning
solutions of SPI/PA6 with mass ratio of 1:9, the membranes
exhibited both the lowest filtration efficiency (80.41%) and the
lowest pressure drop (136 Pa) that could ascribe to the large
pore size formed between the interwoven to the large diameter
fibers, which favored the air permeability but failed to capture
the fine airborne particles. With the decline in the proportion
of PA6 (SPI/PA6 with mass ratio of 2/8), the nanofibrous mem-
branes possessed a higher filtration efficiency (95.79%) but a
higher pressure drop (233 Pa). Further reducing the PA6 con-
centration from 3/7 to 5/5 leads to the pressure drop rapid
increase, although the filtration efficiency of PM0.3 maintained
high removal efficiency, which is clearly demonstrated in Figure
3(a). QF was used to characterize the filter performance. The
higher the QF, the better the filter performance. QF was nega-
tively proportional to the pressure drop, while positively pro-
portional to filtration efficiency. As displayed in Figure 3(b), the
QF of 1/9-SPI/PA6, 2/8-SPI/PA6, 3/7-SPI/PA6, 4/6-SPI/PA6, 5/5-
SPI/PA6 were 0.012, 0.014, 0.006, 0.004, and 0.003 Pa21, respec-
tively. Noticeably, the optimized filter with SPI/PA6 mass ratio
of 2:8, possessing the optimal porous for efficient interception
and air permeability exhibited the highest value among these
samples.
In addition, the porosity and pore size are related to the filter
areal density of the nanofibrous membranes. To evaluate filtra-
tion performance of nanofibrous membranes with different
areal density, a series of the samples with SPI/PA6 mass ratio of
2:8 were studied under the industrial standard face velocity of
32 L/min, as shown in Figure 3(c,d). It is clearly demonstrated
that efficiency filtration and pressure drop generally increased
nonlinearly with the areal density, which might be induced by
complicated changes in porous structure of these nanofibrous
membranes prepared by adjusting electrospinning time. Further,
when the number of nanofibers of per unit area increased, the
pore size of the nanofiber not only dropped, but a shift in pore
size distribution is toward lower values, which leads to the syn-
chronous increase of filtration efficiency and pressure drop.
J. APPL. POLYM. SCI. 2017, DOI: 10.1002/APP.45766
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Figure 3(c) presents the filtration efficiency of the nanofibrous
membranes, fabricated by an SPI/PA6 with mass ratio of 2:8,
with areal density of 1.52, 2.70, 4.21, 5.84, 7.92, 9.11, and
11.40 g/m2, were 45.32%, 73.33%, 95.39%, 96.81%, 98.89%,
99.53%, and 99.83%, respectively, and the corresponding pres-
sure drop were 46, 83.5, 138, 193.5, 249.5, 310, and 344.5 Pa,
intuitive indicating a synchronous improvement of filtration
efficiency and pressure drop with the increment of basis weight.
From Figure 3(c), we can conclude that the filtration efficiency
showed a rapid increase and then reached a relatively stable
high equilibrium value when the areal density is 9.11 g/m2,
while the pressure drop curves shift upward continuously. QF
mentioned above is used to comprehensively evaluate the air-
filtering performance. Therefore, the better the filter perfor-
mance, the higher the QF. As far as we are concerned [Figure
3(d)], the QF of the nanofibrous membranes with areal density
of 1.52, 2.70, 4.21, 5.84, 7.92, 9.11, and 11.40 g/m2 were 0.013,
0.015, 0.022, 0.018, 0.018, 0.018, and 0.019 Pa21. In summary,
the optimized areal density of nanofibrous membranes was
designed to be 4.21 g/m2.
Removal of Toxic Chemical Gas.. Apart from efficient removal
efficiency of fine particles with different size, the protein-based
nanostructured fibers exhibited excellent removal efficiencies of
toxic chemical gas. In this study, the dynamic filtration equip-
ment of cigarette-smoke pollutants with a large amount of
formaldehyde (HCHO) and carbon monoxide (CO) molecules
was performed to measure the intuitive removal efficiency of
toxic chemical gas, which is shown in Figure 4(a). This device
can be utilized for dynamic simulation of air-filter removal effi-
ciency for toxic gas. As can be seen from Figure 4(a), two filter
bottles were connected by a rubber plug which possess two air
flow channels, and the SPI/PA6 nanofibrous membranes could
be easily loaded on it. To ensure the dynamic airflow passing
through the entire test device, the device was connected to a
circulating water pump through a plastic syringe without the
piston rod. Finally, all the junctions of the device were fully
sealed by sealing tapes. The red dotted line is the smoke column
formed during the filtration test. In order to observe the path
of gas flow more intuitively, the three-dimensional model of the
device and rubber stopper are displayed in Figure 4(b). Air flow
from the rubber plugs first entered the up-filter bottle along the
channel where the cigarette was loaded, and then the large size
aperture channel with loading SPI/PA6 nanofibrous membranes,
and finally the down-filter bottle. At last, the gas is pulled away
from the device. The power of the air flow is provided by the
circulating water pump during the experimental process. As Fig-
ure 4(b) demonstrates, the path of gas flow is indicated by the
green arrows. The yellow part of the rubber plugs is filter media
(SPI/PA6 nanofibrous membranes). Figure 4(c) shows the SPI/
PA6 membranes before (the up photo) and after (the down
photo) cigarette-smoke pollutants capture test. It is clear that
toxic cigarette-smoke pollutants have been entangled with nano-
fibers, covered the entire surface, and formed a coating layer on
the nanofibrous membranes. From the above results, we can
conclude that the protein-based nanostructured membranes also
possess high removal efficiency of toxic chemical gas.

Figure 3. Filtration efficiency, pressure drop, and QF of PSI/PA6 nanofibrous membranes at the flow rate of 32 L/min. (a) Removal efficiency and pres-
sure drop (air-flow resistance) of SPI/PA6 nanofibrous membranes with different mass ratio of SPI: PA6. (b) QF of SPI/PA6 nanofibrous membranes
also with different mass ratio of SPI: PA6. (c) Filtration efficiency and pressure drop with an SPI/PA6 mass ratio of 2:8 nanofibrous membranes with var-
ious areal density. (d) QF of SPI/PA6 with mass ratio of 2:8 with various areal density. [Color figure can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com]

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Figure 4. Toxic cigarette-smoke pollutants removal performance measurement of air-filter materials. (a) cigarette-smoke pollutants dynamic filtration
equipment, (b) schematic illustration of the setup for cigarette-smoke pollutants removal efficiency measurement, (c) SPI/PA6 nanofibrous membranes
before and after cigarette-smoke pollutants capture test. [Color figure can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com]

Filtration Mechanism antibacterial activity. To evaluate the antibacterial activity of

To further understand the interaction between PM and SPI/PA6
nanofibrous membranes, the pure PA6 nanofibrous membranes, SPI/
PA6 nanofibrous membranes before filtration, and SPI/PA6 nanofi-
brous membranes after filtration were characterized by FTIR. The
FTIR spectra of the cigarette-smoke pollutants is shown in Figure
5(a). The characterized peaks at 3403, 2973, 1625, 1558, 1506, and
1456 cm21 were described as stretching vibration of OAH, CAH,
C@O, and the last CAO (last three peaks) groups, respectively. These
groups in polluted air can strongly interact with the functional group
on the surface of air-filter mat. By comparing the infrared spectra of
pure PA6 and SPI/PA6 nanofibrous membranes [shown in Figure
5(b)], it is easy to identify the purity of SPI in the fiber by the hydroxyl
signals. Although no new peaks were observed between the SPI/PA6
nanofibrous membranes and the pollutants, the individual peaks have
a certain strength (e.g., OAH, COOH, NAH, and CAH function
groups). The absence of a new peak after the filtration test may be
because the interaction between the pollutants and the SPI/PA6 nano-
fibrous membranes is covered by those interactions presented in the
protein. As a result, only an increase in peak intensity can be observed,
rather than a new peak, after filtration.
Evaluation of the Antimicrobial Performance of Nanofibrous
Membranes
Airborne particles include not only fine dust but also bacteria,
some of them is harmful to human health. Considering this
issue, it is necessary for air-filter materials to exhibit excellent
SPI/PA6-AgNPs nanofibrous membranes with different doping
levels against the Gram-positive bacterium like B. subtilis and
Gram-negative bacterium like E. coli, a liquid culture test was
performed. The OD of each nanofibrous membranes was mea-
sured at 600 nm to evaluate the antibacterial activity and the
obtained results were plotted against AgNPs doping level (the
concentration of AgNPs, the mass of AgNO3, and other detail
parameter in film samples are given in Table I) as shown in Fig-
ure 6(a,b). It was observed that the antimicrobial activity of
nanofibrous membranes against B. subtilis and E. coli increased
first and then decreased when AgNPs doping level increased
while the inhibition of E. coli was slightly larger than B. subtilis,
which may due to the difference in structures and chemical
composition of bacteria cell surface.37
Several mechanisms of antibacterial activity of AgNPs against bac-
teria have been proposed.38 To begin with, AgNPs adhere to the
surface of negatively charged cell membrane, causing loss of cell
permeability and respiration. Then, AgNPs penetrate into the cell
body, which results in damaging due to the interaction with sulfur
and phosphorus found in biological components such as DNA.
Finally, AgNPs induce cell-lysis, cell leakage, in the end cell death.39
CONCLUSIONS
In conclusion, a multi-functional nanofibrous membrane with a
complete filtration efficiency (over 99%) compared with other

Figure 5. Study of the filtration mechanism of SPI/PA6 nanofibrous membranes. (a) FTIR characterization of toxic cigarette-smoke pollutants, (b) FTIR
characterization of PA6, SPI/PA6 nanofibrous membranes before and after filtration. [Color figure can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com]

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Figure 6. (a) OD at 600 nm of B. subtilis and E. coli and (b) percentage of bacterial inhibition against pure and AgNPs-doped SPI/PA6 nanofibrous
membranes. N0, N1, N2, N3, N4, N5, N6 represent SPI/PA6 nanofibrous membranes with AgNPs concentration of 0, 0.1, 0.2, 0.3, 0.4, 0.5, and 0.6 wt
%, respectively. The SPI/PA6 nanofibrous membranes with a mass ratio of 2:8. [Color figure can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com]
reports from Ding’s group3,40 was fabricated by protein/polymer
as raw materials. Based on the structure of the protein, the
functional groups on the protein (carboxyl, amino, etc.) can sig-
nificantly enhance the interaction between the fiber surface and
pollutants, which is critical for capturing particles that are
much smaller than the pore size and gaseous molecules. The
protein-based nanofibrous membranes exhibit high filtration
efficiency for both dust particles and toxic gas. Meanwhile, the
fiber with AgNPs shows excellent antibacterial activity, which
could effectively prevent human body from bacterial threat.
Moreover, the soy protein was employed as an example to
develop sustainable and environmentally friendly nanomaterials
for air-filtering applications. In short, soy protein-based green
materials may be helpful to discover potential applications for
PM2.5 removal devices and environmental protection systems.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
National Natural Science Foundation of China (nos. 21774060,
21644004), Postgraduate Research & Practice Innovation Program
of Jiangsu Province (SJCX17–0255), Jiangsu key lab of biomass-
based energy and Materials (JSBEM2016011), State Key Labora-
tory for Mechanical Behavior of Materials (20171914), Priority
Academic Program Development of Jiangsu Higher Education
Institutions (PAPD), Top-notch Academic Programs Project of
Jiangsu Higher Education Institutions (TAPP), and Natural Sci-
ence Key Project of the Jiangsu Higher Education Institutions
(16KJA220006) are acknowledged with gratitude. Authors also
thank Advanced Analysis & Testing Center, Nanjing Forestry Uni-
versity for SEM characterization.
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