Development of Medicated Dressings Embedded With Biosynthesized Metal Nanoparticles to Prevent Chronic Wounds Infections

Description

In this study, silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) and gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) were biosynthesized using aqueous extract of spent mushroom substrate (SMS) and chitosan (CS). These nanoparticles exhibited antibacterial and anti-biofilm activities against selected bacterial strains. However, AgNPs had higher activity than AuNPs and therefore, AgNPs were functionalized with anti-biofilm agents, lactoferrin (LTF) or grapheme oxide (GO) to produce AgGO and Ag-LTF. Next, genipin-crosslinked gelatin hydrogels incorporated with Ag-LTF (exhibited the highest activity) were formulated as a wound dressing. Moreover, both Ag-LTF and Ag-LTF loaded hydrogel did not affect the cell viability, migration rate and gene expression of human dermal fibroblast (HDFs) and human epidermal keratinocytes (HEKs) cells, suggesting the non-toxicity of Ag-LTF as well as the hydrogels. In summary, genipin-crosslinked gelatin hydrogel loaded with Ag-LTF was successfully developed and this can be applied as a new strategy for combating biofilm in wound infection which may be applied to accelerate healing of chronic wounds.