An Intelligent Spatially Selective Modified Starch Hydrogel Dressing Breaks the Stability-Efficiency Trade-Off in...

Area of Science:

• Biomaterials Science
• Drug Delivery Systems
• Wound Management Technologies

Background:

• Intelligent hydrogels offer precise drug delivery for wound healing.
• Existing systems struggle with encapsulation stability and release efficiency, especially for lipophilic drugs.
• These limitations hinder therapeutic efficacy and wound healing promotion.

Purpose of the Study:

• To design a novel drug delivery system for improved wound management.
• To enhance the stability and controlled release of lipophilic drugs like curcumin.
• To develop a stimuli-responsive hydrogel for on-demand drug delivery.

Main Methods:

• Integrated spatially selective catalytically modified starch with a stimuli-responsive hydrogel.
• Utilized lipase nanoflowers for regulated hydrophobic modification of starch.
• Developed a curcumin Pickering emulsion stabilized by modified starch and incorporated into a thermosensitive hydrogel (C-PNMs).

Main Results:

• The curcumin Pickering emulsion maintained 65% antioxidant activity over 90 days.
• The C-PNMs system demonstrated rapid, on-demand release in response to wound temperature, achieving 93.4% release rate.
• Achieved approximately 50% improvement in release rate compared to other reported systems.

Conclusions:

• The novel system effectively stabilizes curcumin and provides intelligent, on-demand drug release.
• The enhanced bioactivity preservation and release performance offer a promising strategy for compromised skin management.
• This approach addresses key limitations in current wound healing drug delivery systems.