Iodine–poly(2-vinylpyridine-co-styrene-co-divinylbenzene) charge transfer complexes with antibacterial activity

In this work, we have developed three different copolymers based on 2-vinylpyridine, styrene and crosslinked with divinylbenzene (10–30 mol%). The copolymers were morphologically and chemically characterized by apparent density, swelling degree, elemental analysis, Fourier transform infrared spectrophotometry and optical microscopy. The formation of iodine complexes with these copolymers was carried out by two different procedures: with solvent, or not. The influence of the copolymers structure on the capacity of anchoring iodine has been investigated. The antibacterial properties of polymeric charge transfer complexes were determined towards 103–107 cells/mL dilutions from the auxotrophic AB1157 Escherichia coli strain.