Investigation of Genomic Effect of Zirconium Oxide Nanoparticles in Escherichia coli Bacteria

Abstract: Due to the concerns of the society about the increase of antibiotic resistant infections, many studies and research have been done on nanoparticles and applications of nano-biotechnology. Zirconium Oxide ($\text{ZrO}{2}$) in which called zirconia, is a white oxide of zirconium metal that its diameter is 20 nm. The colloidal size of these particles is often smaller than bacterial and eukaryotic cells. The main intention of this paper is to investigate the effect of different doses of $\text{ZrO}{2}$ NPs on the sequences changes for the $\textit{Escherichia coli}$ ($\textit{E. coli}$) genome. At the first step, $\textit{E. coli}$ was cultured in eosin methylene blue agar and brain heart broth (BHB) mediums, respectively. Then, bacteria were treated with $\text{ZrO}{2}$ NPs at concentrations of 100, 250, and 350 $\mu$g/ml. After treatment, the growth of bacteria was evaluated by utilizing spectrophotometry at 600 nm after incubation times including 2, 4, 6, 8, and 24 hours at 37 $^{\circ}$C. At the second step, the extraction of DNA was performed by using control and treated samples. Then, the changes in the sequence of bacterial genome were investigated using RAPD markers. Finally, NTSYS-PC platform was employed in order to analyze of the results extracted by electrophoresis of products on agarose gel. In this paper, it was observed that $\text{ZrO}{2}$ NPs can inhibit the growth of bacteria at concentrations of 250 and 350 $\mu$g/ml after 8 hours of treatment. It was also found that the $\text{ZrO}{2}$ NPs at different concentrations have not changed the genome sequence of $\textit{E. coli}$. Furthermore, it was concluded that the $\text{ZrO}{2}$ NPs with the concentration of 350 $\mu$g/ml had the highest inhibitory properties without significant changing in the genomic sequence of $\textit{E. coli}$.