A fish-scale derived multifunctional nanofiber membrane for infected wound healing.

The rapid development of modern medicine has put forward new requirements for wound infection healing methods in clinical treatment. Despite the great achievements made in the research and development of various types of dressings in recent years, yet there is still a challenge of multifunctional dressings for effective wound treatment. Herein, a multifunctional nanofibrous membrane was prepared by encapsulating NIR-adsorbed CuS (FSC/CuS) nanoparticles, polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP) and polyvinyl butyral (PVB) with electrospun fish scale collagen. During the evaluation of wound healing, four parameters, including hemostasis time, inflammatory response, cell proliferation, and tissue remodeling, were considered. The results of H&E, Masson and immunohistochemical staining showed that the synergistic effect of composite nanofibers and near-infrared light can inhibit the inflammatory response, promote the proliferation and migration of fibroblasts and keratinocytes, rebuild new tissues, form well-dispersed collagen fibers, etc. It was shown that the FSC/CuS NPs combined with an NIR-driven experimental group exhibited excellent performance in accelerating wound healing in these stages. This kind of nanofibrous scaffold prepared with fish scale and NIR-absorbing agents will have broad application prospects in the healing of infected wounds.

Transdermal Delivery of Indirubin-Loaded Microemulsion Gel: Preparation, Characterization and Anti-Psoriatic Activity.

Psoriasis is an immune disease caused by rapid and incomplete differentiation of skin basal cells. Natural products such as indirubin have historically served as excellent sources for the treatments of psoriasis. However, the poor solubility and bioavailability due to its plane and rigid crystal structure, which limits its efficacy. Herein, to improve the efficacy of indirubin, a hydrogel-based microemulsion drug delivery system was developed for transdermal delivery. The mean droplet size of the optimized microemulsion was 84.37 nm, with a polydispersity index (PDI) less than 0.2 and zeta potential value of 0~-20 mV. The transdermal flux and skin retention of indirubin at 24 h were 47.34 ± 3.59 µg/cm2 and 8.77 ± 1.26 µg/cm2, respectively. The optimized microemulsion was dispersed in carbomer 934 hydrogel to increase the consistency. The indirubin-loaded microemulsion gel was tested on an imiquimod-induced psoriasis mouse model. Results showed that this preparation can improve psoriasis symptoms by down-regulating the expression of IL-17A, Ki67, and CD4+T. This experiment provides great scalability for researchers to treat psoriasis, avoid first-pass effects, and increase the concentration of targeted drugs.