ABSTRACT:
Nanotechnology is currently gained increased attention in various fields of science and technology like imaging, sensing, targeted drug delivery, gene delivery systems and artificial implants which is increasing the commercial usage of products including drugs in the various parts of the world. Because of their extensive consumption, it is necessary to study the harmful effects of nanomaterials particularly their ecotoxic effect and cytoxicity of nontarget organism (NTOs). In the present study, an attempt has been made to study toxic effect of silver and gold nanoparticles coated with chitosan on the gut microbiota of adult zebra fish adopting culture dependent methods. Respective metallic nanoparticles were synthesized by chemical reduction and stabilization of precursor salt and the synthesized polymer coated nanoparticles were characterized by electron microscopy studies and fourier transform spectroscopic studies. Adults of zebra fishes were administrated with lethal dose 50 (LD50) of polymer coated respective nanoparticles and their stress on gut microbiota studied by analysis of gut tissue homogenate of tested fishes adopting culture dependent methods. Chitosan coated silver nanoparticles brought about maximum reduction of microbial count which reveals drastic reduction of microbial count as increasing time periods. Less toxic effect on microbial count has been inferred from chitosan coated gold nanoparticles.