New approach for biological synthesis of reduced graphene oxide

Publication date: Available online 8 August 2019Source: Biochemical Engineering JournalAuthor(s): Carolina Vargas, Raquel Simarro, José Alberto Reina, Luis Fernando Bautista, María Carmen Molina, Natalia González-BenítezAbstractGraphene synthesis has created great interest because of the potential applications in various fields. Many works of graphene synthesis from chemical reduction of graphene oxide involving harmful reactants have been published. A battery of both aerobic and anaerobic gram-negative and gram-positive strains as well as an extremophile microbial consortium from natural environment (Rio Tinto; Spain) were tested in graphene oxide reduction at simplest operating conditions. Results showed biological reduction of GO by all microorganisms, under aerobic conditions without any nutrient and carbon source addition and at room temperature (20-25 °C). UV-Vis spectra of RGO showed the adsorption maximum gradually shifted from 230 nm to 270 nm, indicating an increase in the electronic conjugation. Moreover, G band in Raman spectra of RGO shifted from the original value of 1589 ± 1 cm−1 in GO. TGA analyses indicated that only weak weight losses of 2.5% both at 200 °C and above 300 °C, were achieved for Shewanella baltica strain and extremophile microbial consortium related to the presence of oxygen functional groups, indicating the GO reduction. The main novelty of the present work suggest that RGO biosynthesis was med...
Source: Biochemical Engineering Journal - Category: Biochemistry Source Type: research