Recently, ETH Zurich Robert KKatzschmann published a paper in MaterialsToday entitledperforatedred blood cells enable compressible and injectable hydrogels astherapeutic vehiclesresearch**, a novel injectable hydrogel with shape recovery ability has been proposed.
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About the study
Medical hydrogels need to be applied to the human body in a minimally invasive manner without altering their biochemical and mechanical properties to maximize their best effects. So at present, the key to preparation is to prepare precursor solutions that can be physically or chemically cross-linked after delivery, or formed macroporous hydrogels by freezing before delivery. This study proposes a novel injectable hydrogel with shape recovery ability, which is achieved by integrating perforated erythrocytes into a hydrogel network.
Figure 1: A general overview of the study.
Figure 2: Characterization of syringe injectability of hydrogels.
Figure 3: Physical characterization of hydrogels.
Conclusions of the study
In this study, we describe a method to integrate perforated erythrocytes into a hydrogel network to construct an injectable hydrogel scaffold. The biocomposite hydrogel scaffold has good deformation ability and shape recovery ability. By using perforated erythrocytes with uniform size distributions, a uniform macropore structure can be obtained within the polymer network, thereby reducing batch-to-batch variability and standardizing the injectable material platform. These biocomposite systems and injectable material manufacturing methods provide the foundation for minimally invasive delivery of drug-loaded stents, tissue engineering constructs, and personalized medicine platforms that can be applied to the human body through traditional needle syringe systems.
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