Surface characterization and investigation on antibacterial activity of CuZn nanofibers prepared by electrospinning

•We fabricate CuZn nanofibers via electrospinning with various Cu/Zn ratios.•Chemical and physical properties of CuZn nanofibers were varied by the ratio of Cu/Zn and calcination temperature.•XPS was utilized to assign the chemical environment of CuZn nanofibers.•Antibacterial effects of CuZn nanofibers were examined. In this study, the physicochemical properties and antibacterial activity of copper-zinc (CuZn) nanofibers and nanoparticles were investigated by increasing zinc content in copper, which is known to have antibacterial properties. Copper and zinc nanofibers (CZ NFs) were prepared using the electrospinning method and polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP) was used as a polymer to control the viscosity of the precursor solution (CuZn/PVP). The obtained nanofibers were categorized into two different groups. One group was calcined at 353 K in ambient and the other group at 873 K in Ar environment. These conditions were determined from TG/DTA results. CuZn nanofibers were obtained by removing the solvent and CuZn nanoparticles were obtained by decomposing the polymer. The structural and chemical properties of the fabricated nanofibers were studied using scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). As a result of the antibacterial test, we were able to confirm that the nanofibers tend to exhibit stronger antibacterial effects than nanoparticles. In the case of Cu nanofibers, we observed that Zn(OH)2 has a dominant effect on the antibacterial activity.