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Dissolution and aggregation of Cu nanoparticles in culture media: effects of incubation temperature and particles size

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Abstract

Here, the effects of incubation temperature and particle size on the dissolution and aggregation behavior of copper nanoparticles (CuNPs) in culture media were investigated over 96 h, equivalent to the time period for acute cell toxicity tests. Three CuNPs with the nominal sizes of 25, 50, and 100 nm and one type of micro-sized particles (MPs, ~500 nm) were examined in culture media used for human and fish hepatoma cell lines acute tests. A large decrease in sizes of CuNPs in the culture media was observed in the first 24 h incubation, and subsequently the sizes of CuNPs changed slightly over the following 72 h. Moreover, the decreasing rate in size was significantly dependent on the incubation temperature; the higher the incubation temperature, the larger the decreasing rate in size. In addition to that, we also found that the release of copper ions depended on the incubation temperature. Moreover, the dissolution rate of Cu particles increased very fast in the first 24 h, with a slight increase over the following 72 h.

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Acknowledgments

This research project was financed by the China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (2014M560124) and Graduate School of Technische Universität München. The authors acknowledge Luis Alte García-Olías (Department of Environment, INIA, Spain) for his technical assistance.

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Environmental Chemistry and Ecotoxicology, Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100085, China

    Lingxiangyu Li

  2. Department of Environment, Spanish National Institute for Agricultural and Food Research and Technology - INIA, 28040, Madrid, Spain

    María Luisa Fernández-Cruz, Mona Connolly & José María Navas

  3. Department of Chemistry, Technische Universität München, 85747, Garching, Germany

    Michael Schuster

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  1. Lingxiangyu Li
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  2. María Luisa Fernández-Cruz
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  4. Michael Schuster
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  5. José María Navas
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Correspondence to José María Navas.

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Li, L., Fernández-Cruz, M.L., Connolly, M. et al. Dissolution and aggregation of Cu nanoparticles in culture media: effects of incubation temperature and particles size. J Nanopart Res 17, 38 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11051-015-2865-0

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