Dual nanomaterial systems aiming antimicrobial activity and cancer treatment.

Abstract

In the 21st century, nanotechnology has been emerging as a very promising field, with numerous applications in distinct areas, such as textiles, food agriculture, environment, electronics and in the biomedical field. Among the different categories of nanomaterials, zeolites are a very important class of inorganic materials that have been used in a wide range of applications, specially in the biomedical field, as drug delivery systems (DDS) and as antimicrobial agent. In this work, we explored and combined these two applications, using zeolite NaY as host to incorporate silver ions (a well known antimicrobial agent), followed by loading with an antineoplastic drug, 5‐Fluorouracil (5‐FU), originating a dual biocompatible nanomaterial system, Ag(5‐FU)Y, for microbial infections and non‐melanoma skin cancer treatment, respectively