Polydopamine-incorporated dextran hydrogel drug carrier with tailorable structure for wound healing

Effective methods to treat bacterial infections are highly desired as the abuse of antibiotics has caused multidrug-resistant. Polysaccharide hydrogel-based drug delivery systems possessing inherent large surface area and biocompatibility attributes provide a promising strategy for effective use of antibiotics. Here, we presented an effective method for fabricating macroporous polysaccharide hydrogels composed of dextran (DP) and polydopamine (PDA) for controlled release of antibiotics. The physicochemical properties of resulting DP hydrogels were systematically evaluated by measuring their swelling, viscoelasticity, morphology, sorption and thermal stability, and we could control these properties through simply changing the PDA concentration in a pre-gel solution. The low cytotoxicity of DP hydrogels was demonstrated through a co-culture with mouse fibroblast cells. Moreover, in vitro/vivo antibacterial properties of the drug-loading DP hydrogels were evaluated, and they exhibited good antibacterial and healing performances. We believe that the proposed strategy for facilitation and optimization of polysaccharide hydrogels could offer more hydrogel dressings when choosing suitable carriers for sustained release of antibiotics.