Investigating the catalytic and antimicrobial properties of ternary cesium/polyethylene glycol-SrO supported by molecular docking and DFT analysis

Abstract

This study explores the use of ternary system nanocomposites to degrade methyl orange (MO) dye in water as well as assesses their antibacterial properties. For this purpose, the co-precipitation process was adopted to synthesize strontium oxide (SrO) doped with a fixed amount (3 wt%) of polyethylene glycol (PEG) as a capping agent, and various weight ratios (2 and 4 wt%) of cesium (Cs) were added to the binary system (PEG-SrO). Advanced characterization techniques were employed to analyze the various properties of the resulting materials. XRD unveiled the cubic crystal structure of SrO, while TEM revealed randomly oriented nanorods in the pristine sample. The optimum sample (2% Cs/PEG-SrO) demonstrated efficient catalytic activity (CA) in degrading MO dye. The 4% Cs/PEG-SrO sample showed significant bactericidal efficacy against Escherichia coli (E. coli), exhibiting inhibition zones ranging from 2.05 to 6.15 mm at higher concentrations. Furthermore, the computational findings align with the experimental data, offering strong evidence for the microbial effectiveness of Cs/PEG-SrO in hindering DNA gyrase in E. coli.