Liquid Metal Microsphere-Embedded Conductive Hydrogel Enables Electro-Responsive Drug Release for Wound Healing

Area of Science:

• Biomaterials Science
• Regenerative Medicine
• Nanotechnology

Background:

• Electrical stimulation (ES) aids wound repair but optimizing conductive materials with drug release is difficult.
• Liquid metal (LM)-based hydrogels offer potential for dynamic wound modulation and drug delivery.
• Challenges include stable drug loading and synchronizing ES with healing.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop an electro-responsive LM microsphere conductive hydrogel for enhanced wound healing.
• To achieve electrically triggered drug release and precise delivery.
• To investigate the hydrogel's antibacterial activity and wound healing efficacy.

Main Methods:

• Fabrication of LM microspheres with a hierarchical surface structure.
• Engineering an electro-responsive conductive hydrogel.
• Assessing drug loading, ES-triggered release kinetics, and antibacterial efficacy in vitro.
• Evaluating wound closure rates in vivo.

Main Results:

• The hydrogel demonstrated efficient drug loading via electrostatic adsorption.
• Controlled ES-triggered drug release achieved 80% release at 600 mV within 10 h.
• Achieved 100% in vitro antibacterial inhibition and 99.1% in vivo infected wound closure in 15 days.

Conclusions:

• The developed LM conductive hydrogel enables controllable drug delivery and microenvironment modulation.
• This platform supports intelligent, patient-customized wound therapy.
• The hydrogel shows significant potential for accelerating antibacterial and infected wound healing.