In vitro and in vivo Assessment of Silver Nanoparticles against Clostridium botulinum type A botulinum.

BACKGROUND: Clostridium botulinum causes botulism, resulting from the ingestion of a botulinal toxin, which is a serious paralytic illness. Due to strong antimicrobial activity of silver nanoparticles' products, the applications of silver nanoparticles in the field of healthcare in particular are being expanded. Therefore, the objective of current study was to assess a therapeutic strategy for the treatment of botulism toxicity using silver nanoparticles.

METHODS: A preliminary test was conducted, based on the ranges that produce illness in laboratory animals, to determine absolute lethal dose (LD100) of botulinum toxin type A (BoNT/A) in mice. Then, the test animals were divided into six groups containing six mice in each group. Group I, II and III were considered as the negative (botulinum toxin only), the positive control-1 (nano-silver only), and positive control-2 (no treatment); and the remaining groups were allocated to the toxin that supplemented with three nano-silver treatments.

RESULTS: The mortality rates of mice caused by BoNT/A significantly reduced in the treatment groups with different doses and injection intervals of nan-osilver when compared to the negative control group. BoNT/A toxicity induced by intraperitoneal injection of the toxin of Clostridium botulinum causes rapid death while when coupled with nan-osilver results in delayed death in mice.

CONCLUSION: These results, while open to future improvements, represent a preliminary step towards the satisfactory control of BoNT/A by silver nanoparticles for human protection against the challenges bioterrorism threat. Further study in this area will be promising enough to elucidate the underlying mechanism for detoxifying BoNT/A by silver nanoparticles.