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Preparation and evaluation of Thesium chinense extract loaded polyvinyl alcohol/sodium alginate hydrogel for wound healing

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Abstract

A novel composite hydrogel was prepared by combining polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) and sodium alginate (SA) in a specific proportion to serve as a drug carrier, and then loading the extract of Thesium chinense (TCE) onto the drug carrier for use in the trauma treatment. The morphology, structure and biological activity of PVA hydrogel, PVA/SA hydrogel and PVA/SA-TCE hydrogel were characterized, and their wound healing effects on SD rats were investigated. The results show that at a PVA content of 5 wt% and a SA content of 0.6 wt%, the swelling rate of PVA/SA-TCE hydrogel reached 1351 ± 32.0%, indicating excellent liquid absorption and permeation capabilities. When loaded with 2 mg/mL of TCE, PVA/SA-TCE hydrogel exhibited no cytotoxicity and achieved a drug release rate of over 50% at 24 h in buffer solutions with different pH values. Additionally, PVA/SA-TCE hydrogel demonstrated superior anti-inflammatory, antioxidant and antibacterial properties compared to PVA and PVA/SA hydrogels. It effectively prevented the infiltration of Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus, reducing the risk of bacterial infection. In SD rats with full cortical incision, the application of PVA/SA-TCE hydrogel was found to promote wound healing significantly. The wound healing rate on the 20th day reached 99.7%, which was notably higher than that of the control group.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank Prof. Tiantao Zhao for the great assistance, as well as Chongqing University of Technology for providing the financial support for this study via the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No.51978117).

Funding

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 51978117).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Pharmacy and Bioengineering, Chongqing University of Technology, Chongqing, 400054, China

    Lijie Zhang, Mei Zhang, Weiqun Tan, Zhengfa Ma & Tiantian Yu

  2. School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Chongqing University of Technology, Chongqing, 400054, China

    Tiantao Zhao

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  1. Lijie Zhang
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Contributions

LZ contributed to conceptualization, methodology, analysis, funding, supervision and editing. MZ contributed to conceptualization, methodology, analysis and writing. WT, ZM and YZ contributed to conceptualization, supervision and editing. TZ contributed to funding, supervision and editing.

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Correspondence to Lijie Zhang.

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Zhang, L., Zhang, M., Tan, W. et al. Preparation and evaluation of Thesium chinense extract loaded polyvinyl alcohol/sodium alginate hydrogel for wound healing. Polym. Bull. 81, 6225–6247 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00289-023-04990-4

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