Title : Personalized nanofiber-based strategy for smart regulation of diabetic wounds
Abstract:
Different from normal wounds, wound management for patients with diabetes and metabolic disorders is challenged by spatiotemporally dynamic wound microenvironment. However, diabetes-specific wound care is not sufficiently explored and diabetic wounds are challenged by poor healing outcomes and high recurrence rates. Therefore, a tailor-designed wound dressing is important for diabetes-specific wound care. Utilizing in situ electrospinning with portability and flexibility, the study aims to develop personalized wound dressings based on the pathophysiological characteristics and time course of diabetic wounds. Different from traditional pre-fabricated wound dressings, the personalized nanofiber-based wound care strategy enables the delivery of versatile formulations to adapt to the dynamic and heterogeneous wound microenvironment at different healing phases. The custom-designed and dynamic wound dressing could provide an effective therapeutic strategy to enhance the response rate and accelerate the healing of diabetic wounds. Arginine metabolism is essential in shaping immune regulation for diabetic wound healing. Nitric oxide (NO) derived by arginine via the inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS) pathway is critical for orchestrating the immune regulation in diabetic wounds. Meanwhile, arginine metabolized via the Arginase pathway contributes to collagen synthesis and cell proliferation. In this research, a class of arginine-based pseudo-protein polymers is developed and provides the regulatory potential to direct wound healing. Utilizing portable electrospinning technology, the as-developed polymers directly deposit as nanofibrous wound dressing onto the diabetic wounds. The study emphasizes the structure-process-property relationship for the design and development of customized formulations, as well as the diabetes-specific considerations to provide dynamic and spatiotemporal regulations of wound microenvironment, to promote diabetic wound healing.
