State Key Laboratory of Electrical Insulation and Power Equipment, Centre for Plasma Biomedicine, Xi'an Jiaotong University, Xi'an City, 710049, People's Republic of China.
School of Chemistry and Physics, Centre for Materials Science, and Centre for Biomedical Technologies, Queensland University of Technology (QUT), Brisbane, QLD, 4000, Australia.
Adv Sci (Weinh). 2023 May;10(14):e2207407. doi: 10.1002/advs.202207407. Epub 2023 Mar 16.
A continuous risk from microbial infections poses a major environmental and public health challenge. As an emerging strategy for inhibiting bacterial infections, plasma-activated water (PAW) has proved to be highly effective, environmental-friendly, and non-drug resistant to a broad range of microorganisms. However, the relatively short lifetime of reactive oxygen and nitrogen species (RONS) and the high spreadability of liquid PAW inevitably limit its real-life applications. In this study, plasma-activated hydrogel (PAH) is developed to act as reactive species carrier that allow good storage and controlled slow-release of RONS to achieve long-term antibacterial effects. Three hydrogel materials, including hydroxyethyl cellulose (HEC), carbomer 940 (Carbomer), and acryloyldimethylammonium taurate/VP copolymer (AVC) are selected, and their antibacterial performances under different plasma activation conditions are investigated. It is shown that the composition of the gels plays the key role in determining their biochemical functions after the plasma activation. The antimicrobial performance of AVC is much better than that of PAW and the other two hydrogels, along with the excellent stability to maintain the antimicrobial activity for more than 14 days. The revealed mechanism of the antibacterial ability of the PAH identifies the unique combination of short-lived species ( O , ∙OH, ONOO and O ) stored in hydrogels. Overall, this study demonstrates the efficacy and reveals the mechanisms of the PAH as an effective and long-term disinfectant capable of delivering and preserving antibacterial chemistries for biomedical applications.
微生物感染的持续风险对环境和公共卫生构成了重大挑战。作为一种抑制细菌感染的新兴策略，等离子体激活水（PAW）已被证明对广泛的微生物具有高效、环保、非耐药的特点。然而，活性氧和氮物种（RONS）的相对短寿命和液体 PAW 的高扩散性不可避免地限制了其实际应用。在本研究中，开发了等离子体激活水凝胶（PAH）作为活性物质载体，允许 RONS 的良好储存和受控缓慢释放，以实现长期的抗菌效果。选择了三种水凝胶材料，包括羟乙基纤维素（HEC）、卡波姆 940（Carbomer）和丙烯酰二甲基氨基乙酯/VP 共聚物（AVC），并研究了它们在不同等离子体激活条件下的抗菌性能。结果表明，凝胶的组成在确定其等离子体激活后的生化功能方面起着关键作用。AVC 的抗菌性能远优于 PAW 和另外两种水凝胶，并且具有出色的稳定性，可以保持抗菌活性超过 14 天。PAH 的抗菌能力的揭示机制确定了储存在水凝胶中的短寿命物质（O、∙OH、ONOO 和 O ）的独特组合。总的来说，这项研究证明了 PAH 的功效，并揭示了其作为一种有效且长效消毒剂的机制，能够输送和保存用于生物医学应用的抗菌化学物质。
