Novel supramolecular self-healing silk fibroin-based hydrogel via host–guest interaction as wound dressing to enhance wound healing

Silk fibroin (SF) based hydrogels possess great potential in wound healing. However, they have limitations as wound dressings, such as long-gelation time, high temperature or organic solvent-assisted treatment, and lack of self-healing property. In this study, a supramolecular hydrogel based on SF, acryloyl-β-cyclodextrin (Ac-CD) and 2-hydroxyethyl acrylate was developed through a facile method by photo-polymerization of acrylate under UV irradiation, and showed enhanced performance as wound dressing than commercial dressing. This SF based hydrogel was confirmed to be dually crosslinked by host–guest interaction and hydrophobic β-sheet conformation, and demonstrated improved mechanical properties, long-term stability, rapid self-healing behavior, injectability, and good biocompatibility, benefiting its application as wound dressing. Moreover, as a drug carrier owing abundant CDs, the hydrophobic drug curcumin with antioxidant and anti-inflammatory activity was loaded in SF-based hydrogel, accompanying with a controlled and sustained release profile, therewith boosting better wound healing performance with generating higher granulation tissue thickness, collagen disposition, upregulating vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), and decreasing inflammatory response in a full-thickness skin defect model. In conclusion, this novel self-healing SF-based hydrogel is of great value in wound healing and enriches the fabrication methodology of SF-based self-healing biomaterials as well.