Synergistic Antimicrobial Glycyrrhizic Acid-Based Functional Biosensing Composite for Sensitive Glucose Monitoring and Collaborative Wound Healing.

High glucose blood and bacterial infection remain major issues for the slow healing of diabetic wounds, so developing functional biosensing composite with excellent antibacterial and remarkable glucose response sensitivity is necessary and prospective. Herein, by in situ synthesis AgNPs on the surface of self-prepared PTIGA elastomers, PTIGA-AgNPs conductive composites are obtained with efficient synergistic antibacterial effect, excellent mechanical and self-healing properties. The strain of the composites can reach 1800%, and its self-healing efficiency exceeds 90% at 60 °C within 8 h. Both elastomers and composites represent excellent biocompatibility and the antibacterial rate against E. coli and S. aureus exceeded 90%. Moreover, the biosensor assembled from the conductive composites exhibits excellent glucose response sensitivity and stability, with a sensitivity coefficient of 0.518 mA mm-1 in the range of 0.2-3.6 × 10-3 m glucose concentration, as well as a low detection limit of 0.08 × 10-3 m. Furthermore, based on the remarkable antibacterial performance and bioactivity derived from GA, the composites reduce the expression of pro-inflammatory factors and promote the production of anti-inflammatory factors, and effectively promote the regeneration of skin and granulation tissue of wounds in a diabetic full-thickness skin defect model, demonstrating the enormous therapeutic potential in diabetic wound healing.

A sensitive non-enzymatic dual-conductive biosensor for continuous glucose monitoring.

BACKGROUND: Diabetes and diabetic wound management have always been urgent issues for global healthcare. In the demand for blood glucose monitoring and wound management, phenylboronic acid (PBA)-based glucose biosensors are effective assistance due to their excellent glucose specificity, high sensitivity, and response stability. Nevertheless, PBA-based glucose biosensors still have challenges in terms of wide linearity and large deformation requirements. Therefore, it is necessary to develop PBA-based glucose biosensors with satisfactory mechanical properties, high response sensitivity, excellent stability, and wide linearity. RESULTS: In this work, a glucose-responsive PBA-based biosensor was successfully synthesized for the first time. The sensor materials exhibited excellent mechanical properties with an elongation at break reached up to 1000%, and the healing efficiency was over 90% within 30 min at 45 °C. Furthermore, the biosensor exhibited exceptional electromechanical responsiveness, stability, high sensitivity, and wide linearity due to the specificity of phenylboronic acid to glucose and the construction of a special HCNT/PEDOT:PSS dual conductive structure. In addition, the assembled biosensor displayed remarkable glucose, pH and temperature responses, exhibiting a linear response to glucose concentration range from 0.20 mM to 2.0 mM, with a sensitivity coefficient of 47.11 mA mM-1 and regression coefficient of 0.942. Moreover, the sensor materials showed satisfactory cytocompatibility, hemocompatibility, and antibacterial properties against Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus. SIGNIFICANCE: For the first time, a dual conductive structural glucose biosensor based on PBA-based copolymer was synthesized. In addition to excellent glucose sensitivity and response stability, the biosensor has a wide linearity range, excellent self-healing property, and satisfactory mechanical performance. As a promising substitute for non-enzymatic glucose biosensors, this new material with special structure and characteristics would also be beneficial to wound management in diabetic patients.

MOF@Polydopamine-incorporated membrane with high permeability and mechanical property for efficient fouling-resistant and oil/water separation.

Metal organic frameworks (MOFs) have demonstrated great potential for their favorable impacts on the performance of water treatment membranes. Herein, the novel nanoparticles based on both nanoporous MOFs and organic PDA layer was exploited as a novel dopant for the fabrication of PES ultrafiltration (UF) membranes. The PDA was synthesized via oxidative self-polymerization under alkaline conditions and formed adhesive coatings on dispersed MOF. The properties of resulting membranes on the porosity, membrane morphology, hydrophilicity, permeability and anti-fouling performance were adequately investigated. The membranes incorporated with MOF@PDA exhibited exceptionally high permeability (209.02 L m-2·h-1), which is approximately 6 times higher than that of the pure PES membrane, and high BSA rejection (99.12%). Notably, the mechanical property and hydrophilicity of the PES membrane were both enhanced by MOF@PDA, and it has been demonstrated that greater hydrophilicity prevents fouling under practical conditions, which results in significant improvements in flux recovery ratio (FRR) (82%). In addition, the modified PES membranes were used to purify the oil/water emulsion, and the results indicates that the membranes have high permeability and rejection of oil/water emulsion, showing its great promise in practical oily sewage remediation.

Amphiphilic Grafted Polymers Based on Citric Acid and Aniline Used to Enhance the Antifouling and Permeability Properties of PES Membranes.

Water treatment technology based on ultrafiltration (UF) faces the problem of severe membrane fouling due to its inherent hydrophobicity. The use of amphiphilic polymers that possess both hydrophobic and hydrophilic chain segments can be advantageous for the hydrophilic modification of UF membranes due to their excellent combination in the membrane matrix. In the present study, we examined a novel amphiphilic CA-g-AN material, constructed by grafting citric acid (CA) to aniline (AN), as a modified material to improve the hydrophilicity of a PES membrane. This material was more compatible with the polymer membrane matrix than a pure hydrophilic modified material. The polyethersulfone (PES) membranes modified by amphiphilic CA-g-AN demonstrated a higher water flux (290.13 L·m-2·h-1), which was more than eight times higher than that of the pure PES membrane. Furthermore, the flux recovery ratio (FRR) of the modified membrane could reach 83.24% and the value of the water contact angle (WCA) was 76.43°, demonstrating the enhanced hydrophilicity and antifouling ability of the modified membranes. With this study, we aimed to develop a new amphiphilic polymer to improve the antifouling property and permeability of polymer-based UF membranes to remove organic pollutants from water.