X maxn 150

Isolated starch sample morphology was investigated using Tescan Mira3 FESEM with Oxford Instruments X-MaxN 150 silicon drift X-ray detector and Aztec software. Starch samples were fixed on a circular metallic microscope stub with carbon aluminum tape and then coated with a 5 nm platinum coating using a sputter coater (208HR, Cressington). The scanning electron microscopy was performed at an accelerating voltage of 2 kV.

Structures of Ag NCs, NPs, Ag-2S, and nanoconjugates were visualized using transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and atomic force microscopy (AFM) as previously described [5 (link),34 (link)]. In brief, Ag NCs with proteins were loaded to “Formvar/Carbon 200 Mesh Copper” copper grids (Ted Pella, Redding, CA 96049-2477, USA) and examined using the TEM system JEM 2100 Plus (JEOL, Akishima-shi, Japan) without contrast. For the Ag NPs conjugated with proteins, additional staining with 1% uranyl acetate was used.
For elemental analysis, SEM with energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX) was carried out. Silicon wafers were treated in an Electronic Diener plasma cleaner (Plasma Surface Technology, Ebhausen, Germany). Silver nanomaterials were then deposited onto the wafers and characterized using a Zeiss Merlin microscope equipped with GEMINI II Electron Optics (Zeiss, Jena, Germany). The SEM parameters were an accelerating voltage of 1–3 kV and a probe current of 30–80 pA. EDX was performed by SEM via Silicon Drift Detector (SDD) X-MaxN 150 (Oxford Instruments, Abingdon, Oxon, UK) and AZtecEnergy EDX Software (Version 3.0).