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Actively contractible and antibacterial hydrogel for accelerated wound healing

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Abstract

Adhesive hydrogel has drawn great attention for wide applications in wound healing owing to its excellent biocompatibility and lasting adhesiveness. However, traditional adhesive hydrogels only keep the wound moist to promote wound healing. It is still imperative to fabricate adhesive hydrogels that exhibit efficient antibacterial ability, active driving dynamic wound closure, and reactive oxygen species (ROS) scavenging together with excellent mechanical properties. Here, a novel hydrogel based on poly(N-isopropyl acrylamide) (PNIPAAm), a thermoresponsive polymer, and tannic acid (TA)-Ag nanoparticles (TA-Ag NPs) exhibiting active contraction, tissue adhesion, anti-inflammatory and antibacterial functions was developed. TA-Ag dispersed in the hydrogel not only functioned as the catalyst to polymerize the reaction but also provided additional anti-inflammatory and antibacterial properties. Besides, tannic acid containing catechol groups endowed the hydrogel with adhesive ability. More interestingly, the obtained hydrogel exhibited the thermoresponsive shrinkage ability, which could mechanically drive wound closure due to the presence of PNIPAAm network. In vivo mouse full-thickness skin defect model demonstrated that this actively contractible and antibacterial hydrogel is a promising dressing to improve wound healing process by accelerating tissue regeneration and preventing bacterial infection. Therefore, this multi-functional adhesive hydrogel developed here may provide a new possibility for wound healing.

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Acknowledgements

This article was partially supported by the National Research Programs of China (Nos. 2020YFA0211100, and 2022YFA1206500), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos. 52250002, and 52325106), Suzhou Key Laboratory of Nanotechnology and Biomedicine, Collaborative Innovation Center of Suzhou Nano Science and Technology, and the 111 Program from the Ministry of Education of China.

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  1. Zhaoxin Ji and Ting Wei contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Functional Nano and Soft Materials, Jiangsu Key Laboratory for Carbon-Based Functional Materials and Devices, Soochow University, Suzhou, 215123, China

    Zhaoxin Ji, Ting Wei, Jiafei Zhu, Jiaying Hu, Zhisheng Xiao, Boxiong Bai, Xinying Lv, Yu Miao, Muchao Chen, Cheng Wang & Qian Chen

  2. Department of Thoracic Surgery, Shanghai Pulmonary Hospital, School of Medicine, Tongji University, Shanghai, 200433, China

    Feng Pan & Yang Yang

  3. Central Laboratory, Shanghai Pulmonary Hospital, School of Medicine, Tongji University, Shanghai, 200433, China

    Yang Yang

  4. School of Materials Science and Engineering, Tongji University, Shanghai, 201804, China

    Yang Yang

  5. Department of dermatology Shanghai Children’s Medical Center, School of Medicine, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, 200025, China

    Meng Li

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  1. Zhaoxin Ji
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  2. Ting Wei
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  3. Jiafei Zhu
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  10. Cheng Wang
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Correspondence to Meng Li or Qian Chen.

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Ji, Z., Wei, T., Zhu, J. et al. Actively contractible and antibacterial hydrogel for accelerated wound healing. Nano Res. (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12274-024-6674-6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12274-024-6674-6

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