College of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science, Tianjin University of Science and Technology, No.29, 13th Avenue, TEDA, Tianjin 300457, China.
Key Laboratory of Industrial Fermentation Microbiology (Ministry of Education), Tianjin University of Science and Technology, Tianjin 300457, China.
Int J Biol Macromol. 2018 Jul 15;114:1233-1239. doi: 10.1016/j.ijbiomac.2018.04.025. Epub 2018 Apr 7.
Injectable and self-healing hydrogels have found numerous applications in drug delivery, tissue engineering and 3D cell culture. Herein, we report an injectable self-healing carboxymethyl chitosan (CMCh) supramolecular hydrogels cross-linked by zinc ions (Zn). Supramolecular hydrogels were obtained by simple addition of metal ions solution to CMCh solution at an appropriate pH value. The mechanical properties of these hydrogels were adjustable by the concentration of Zn. For example, the hydrogel with the highest concentration of Zn (CMCh-Zn4) showed strongest mechanical properties (storage modulus11,000Pa) while hydrogel with the lowest concentration of Zn (CMCh-Zn1) showed weakest mechanical properties (storage modulus220Pa). As observed visually and confirmed rheologically, the CMCh-Zn1 hydrogel with the lowest Zn concentration showed thixotropic property. CMCh-Zn1 hydrogel also presented injectable property. Moreover, the antibacterial properties of the prepared supramolecular hydrogels were studied against Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus) and Escherichia coli (E. coli) by agar well diffusion method. The results revealed Zn dependent antibacterial properties against both kinds of strains. The inhibition zones were ranging from ~11-24mm and ~10-22mm against S. aureus and E. coli, respectively. We believe that the prepared supramolecular hydrogels could be used as a potential candidate in biomedical fields.
可注射和自修复水凝胶在药物输送、组织工程和 3D 细胞培养中有着广泛的应用。在此，我们报道了一种可注射的自修复羧甲基壳聚糖（CMCh）超分子水凝胶，其通过锌离子（Zn）交联。超分子水凝胶通过将金属离子溶液在适当的 pH 值下简单地添加到 CMCh 溶液中获得。这些水凝胶的机械性能可以通过 Zn 的浓度来调节。例如，Zn 浓度最高的水凝胶（CMCh-Zn4）表现出最强的机械性能（储能模量11000Pa），而 Zn 浓度最低的水凝胶（CMCh-Zn1）表现出最弱的机械性能（储能模量220Pa）。从视觉上观察到的和流变学上确认的结果来看，Zn 浓度最低的 CMCh-Zn1 水凝胶具有触变特性。CMCh-Zn1 水凝胶还具有可注射性。此外，通过琼脂孔扩散法研究了所制备的超分子水凝胶对金黄色葡萄球菌（S. aureus）和大肠杆菌（E. coli）的抗菌性能。结果表明，Zn 对这两种菌株都具有依赖于浓度的抗菌性能。抑菌圈的范围分别为11-24mm 和10-22mm，分别针对 S. aureus 和 E. coli。我们相信，所制备的超分子水凝胶可作为生物医学领域的潜在候选材料。
