Biosynthesized Silver Nanoparticles Using Green Chemistry Approach and its Evaluation as Antifungal Agent

Silver nanoparticles (Ag-NPs) have emerged as potential antifungal agents due to their exceptional properties. These nanoparticles can be synthesised in the laboratory by using green synthetic methods. Hence, in the present study dark brown colour Ag-NPs have been synthesized from 0.01 mM AgNO₃ using Azadirachta indica leaf extract as a reducing agent and characterised via different spectroscopic and microscopic techniques. The average particle sizes of the synthesized Ag-NPs are found to be 36 nm and all the particles are mostly spherical in shape. These biosynthesized Ag-NPs effectively have mitigated the mycelial growth of F. oxysporum and F. moniliforme. However, the inhibition has been found better for F. oxysporum as compared to F. moniliforme. At 500 ppm concentration of Ag-NPs, the reductions in mycelial growth have been found to be 100 and 80% for F. oxysporum and F. moniliforme, respectively. So, it can be concluded from the study that Ag-NPs prepared from A. indica leaf extracts could be explored for developing fungicidal formulations.