Ceramic magnetic ferrite nanoribbons: Eco-friendly synthesis and their antifungal and parasiticidal activity

Abstract Ceramic nanostructures with their unique morphologies have attractive properties and various biomedical and medical applications. The production of nanoparticles (NPs) with a special morphology has been strongly influenced by lab-scale synthesis conditions and the type of reducing agents. Generally, the production of NPs with unique shapes and sizes can be adjusted by changing and optimizing the reaction mixture conditions and parameters. The formation of ceramic nanostructures during synthesis process contained the nucleation, seeding, and growth steps. By altering the kinetics and thermodynamics of synthesis process (at each stage), the shape of the produced nanostructures can be controlled. In this study, nickel ferrite ceramic nanoribbons were produced through a green and environmentally-friendly method based on the bioethical principles of preventing environmental damage, without using any other chemical composition, and only by applying plant extracts as reducing and stabilizing agents. The prepared ceramic nanoribbons were evaluated by XRD, SEM, FTIR, VSM, and HR-TEM. The results confirmed that the calcination could significantly affect the size and shape of the resulting ceramic nanostructures. The calcination could lead to the deformation of thin and hair-like ceramic nanoribbons into spherical NPs (∼20 nm). Additionally, the antiparasitic properties of these nanoribbons were evaluated using MTT method, and the antifungal effects were analyzed against Aspergillus ustus. The obtained results illustrated that these nanostructures had significant toxicity against Leishmania tropica and A. ustus.