Facile fabrication of self-healing, injectable and antimicrobial cationic guar gum hydrogel dressings driven by hydrogen bonds

Developing self-healing polysaccharide hydrogels offers a promising strategy for the healing of full-thickness skin wounds. However, the green and facile fabrication of self-healing polysaccharide hydrogel dressings is chal-lenging. Herein, a novel hydrogen-bonded polysaccharide hydrogel consisting only of cationic guar gum (CG) and CuCl2 was developed by simply mixing CG and Cu2+ solution. A strong enough intermolecular hydrogen bonding could be formed between ipsilateral hydroxyl groups to induce rapid gelation. Benefiting from dynamic and reversible linkages, cationic guar gum-Cu2+ (CG-Cu) hydrogels exhibited self-healing, injectable and self-adaption. The CG-Cu hydrogels possessed favorable mechanical strength (compression strength: 50-89 kPa), excellent biocompatibility (cell viability: >95 %; hemolysis ratio: < 5 %) and satisfying antibacterial ability. In vivo degradation tests showed that the CG-Cu hydrogels could be completely degraded after 21 days. Further-more, in-situ injected CG-Cu hydrogel dressings could perfectly cover wounds to reduce risk of infection and accelerated full-thickness skin generation. In conclusion, this study may provide a new simple and straightfor-ward strategy to prepare self-healing polysaccharide hydrogels based on hydrogen bonding to expand its application in the field of biomedicine and tissue regeneration.

Automated summary

A novel hydrogen-bonded polysaccharide hydrogel consisting of cationic guar gum and CuCl2 was developed, which exhibited self-healing, injectable, and self-adapting properties. The hydrogel showed good mechanical strength, biocompatibility, antibacterial ability, and complete degradation in vivo. This study provides a simple and straightforward strategy for preparing self-healing polysaccharide hydrogels based on hydrogen bonding, expanding their applications in biomedicine and tissue regeneration.