Natural Dual-Crosslinked Self-Healing Hydrogels for In Situ Wound Healing

Poly(l-glutamic acid) (PLGA), a polypeptide prepared by bacteria fermentation, has broad applications in tissue engineering. A natural host-guest pair of beta-cyclodextrin (beta-CD) and bile acid molecules are attached covalently onto the PLGA backbones separately, and host-guest crosslinked self-healing hydrogels can be easily formed by mixing these polymer solutions. Inspired by the adhesives of mussel foot proteins, a dopamine methyl acrylamide derivative is introduced into this system to prepare a PLGA-based dual-network hydrogel in situ through the combination of host-guest crosslinking and the photo-crosslinking of the dopamine derivative. The mechanical properties of the hydrogels can be tuned by altering the molar ratios of beta-CD and bile acid as well as the content of dopamine methyl acrylamide derivative. The dynamic inclusion complexation of beta-CD and bile acid allows the hydrogel to self-heal rapidly under ambient atmosphere and their mechanical properties can recover to original levels within 1 min as evidenced in rheological results. The dual-network hydrogels exhibit stronger adhesion behavior to pig skin than the host-guest crosslinked hydrogels in vitro. The adhesion of the dual-network hydrogels to rat whole cortical incision has promoted faster wound healing and tissue regeneration than that in sutured treatments in vivo.

Automated summary

Poly(l-glutamic acid) (PLGA), a polypeptide prepared by bacteria fermentation, has broad applications in tissue engineering. Through the combination of host-guest crosslinking and the photo-crosslinking of a dopamine derivative, a PLGA-based dual-network hydrogel with self-healing and strong adhesion properties is prepared. The hydrogel shows rapid healing and tissue regeneration in vivo.