The silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) incorporated reverse osmosis (RO) membranes with an excellent antibacterial property has been reported. However, the incorporated AgNPs could increase the hydraulic resistance of membrane, indicating the decline of water flux. Here, hybrid silver nanoparticles (Ag@SiO2, 400 nm) were strongly immobilized using Ag-S chemical bonding on the polyamide surface of RO membrane for both protecting the decline membrane performance and having a strong antimicrobial property. The membrane performance was unchanged after the immobilization of silver nanoparticles, when compared to that of unmodified membrane. In addition, the silver-polyamide composite membrane significant reduced the number of live bacteria attached on the membrane surface by 92.7 ± 1.8, 99.5 ± 0.3, and 73.3 ± 5.5% for E. coli, P. aeruginosa, and S. aureus, respectively. The strong antimicrobial property is ascribed to the combination effect by the directly attachment to bacteria surface and the penetration of released silver ions inside the cell membrane of bacteria.

The effect of the ethanol extract from salviae miltiorrhizae radix (Salvia miltiorrhiza) on the microbial growth and the stability of the extracted antimicrobial material were investigated. The ethanol extract had strong growth inhibition activity (MIC, 3.13-50.0 pg/ml) against Gram-positive bacteria such as B. subtilis, L. monocytogenes and S. aureus. Among Gram-positive bacteria tested, B. subtilis was the most susceptible to the extracted substance. While the antimicrobial activity of the ethanol extract was weak (MIC, 400-800 ug/ml) to E. coli and yeasts (C. albicans. Sacch. diastaticus). The ethanol extract had bactericidal action at higher concentration than MIC against B. subtilis, while the extract had only bacteriostatic action against S. aureus. The extracted antimicrobial substance was stable in the pH range of 4.0 to 10.0, heat treatment at 121℃ for 15 min, and freezing and thawing