Facile synthesis of tannic acid modified NbTe2 nanosheets for effective photothermal ablation of bacterial pathogens

Abstract Photothermal antibacterial methods are urgently needed in the treatment of bacterial infectious diseases and drug-resistant bacteria, which is due to the abuse of antibiotics leading to the production of drug-resistant bacteria, resulting in poor treatment of diseases. However, it is very challenging to improve the yield of nanomaterial preparation and surface modification, while also ensuring the enhancement of antibacterial properties. Herein, we report a tannic acid-assisted peeling method to prepare a single-layer tannic acid (TA) modified NbTe2 nanosheets (NbTe2/TA) with high production yield (≈ 52 ± 10%) and multiple antibacterial properties. NbTe2/TA nanosheets show uniform particle size and ultra-thin thickness. In near-infrared light, NbTe2/TA demonstrates excellent photothermal conversion performance and photothermal stability, further demonstrating the potential of NbTe2/TA for photothermal antibacterial applications. It is worth noting that TA has excellent antibacterial properties, which can further enhance the photothermal antibacterial properties of NbTe2/TA. Moreover, NbTe2/TA has been shown to have good biosecurity which does not damage epithelium and fibroblasts. To the best of our knowledge, the above NbTe2 stripping method is superior to the previously reported NbTe2 peeling method and is the first time applied to the study of photothermal antibacterial.