Sustainable sepiolite-based composites for fast clotting and wound healing

Uncontrolled bleeding and bacterial coinfection are the major causes of death after an injury. Fast hemostatic capacity, good biocompatibility, and bacterial coinfection inhibition pose great challenges to hemostatic agent development. A prospective sepiolite/Ag nanoparticles (sepiolite@AgNPs) composite has been prepared by using natural clay sepiolite as template. A tail vein hemorrhage mouse model and a rabbit hemorrhage model were used to evaluate the hemostatic properties of the composite. The sepiolite@AgNPs composite can quickly absorb fluid to subsequently stop bleeding due to the natural fibrous crystal structure of sepiolite, and inhibit bacterial growth with the antibacterial ability of AgNPs. Compared with commercially-available zeolite material, the as-prepared composite exhibits competitive hemostatic properties without exothermic reaction in the rabbit model of femoral and carotid artery injury. The rapid hemostatic effect was due to the efficient absorption of erythrocyte and activation of the coagulation cascade factors and platelets. Besides, after heat-treatment, the composites can be recycled without significant reduction of hemostatic performance. Our results also prove that sepiolite@AgNPs nanocomposites can stimulate wound healing. The sustainability, lower-cost, higher bioavailability, and stronger hemostatic efficacy of sepiolite@AgNPs composite render these nanocomposites as more favorable hemostatic agents for hemostasis and wound healing.