Green synthesis of palladium nanoparticles using lentinan for catalytic activity and biological applications

The green synthesis of palladium nanoparticles (Pd NPs) for catalysis and biological applications has been gaining great interest. To replace complex plant extracts, lentinan (LNT) may be a good reducing and stabilizing agent. In this work, a simple and green method using LNT to reduce and stabilize palladium Pd NPs was verified. The resulting LNT stabilized palladium nanoparticles (Pdn-LNT NPs) were characterized by UV-Vis spectroscopy, DLS, TEM, and XPS. The results indicated that Pd NPs inside of Pdn-LNT NPs had a small size (2.35–3.32 nm). Pdn-LNT NPs were stable in solution for 7 days. In addition, Pdn-LNT NPs had higher catalytic activity towards the reduction of 4-nitrophenol than other catalysts. More importantly, Pdn-LNT NPs had negligible cytotoxicity towards cells and showed good antioxidant activity. Taken together, the prepared Pdn-LNT NPs have great potential bio-related applications.