CAREER: Stimuli-responsive biomaterials for wound healing and drug delivery

Non-technical abstract Wound healing and arthritis treatment are two areas that people care about. New classes of “smart” hydrogels that respond to environment and change their stiffness will be developed for removable wound dressings and arthritis treatment. This work will improve healing outcome for millions of patients each year. In addition to practical applications, these materials will provide tools and methods that could be used by everyone to rationally design hydrogel materials and will contribute to development of the wider fields of dynamic nanomaterials, drug delivery and biosensing. The educational component integrates research efforts and several education programs in biomaterials by 1) developing a research training program for high school students from Syracuse City School District (SCSD); 2) providing research training for undergraduate students that participate in Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) at Syracuse University and 3) designing an outreach model of biomaterials for the Milton J. Rubinstein Museum of Science and Technology (MOST) in Syracuse. Through these multi-prong outreach programs, students across different age groups will be inclusively engaged with a particular emphasis on training women, underrepresented minorities, and refugees. Educational programs will not only provide a training ground for future biochemists but will also generate valuable results to advance the research field. Technical abstract The goal of this proposal is to design peptide-based, smart, stimuli-responsive biocompatible antimicrobial materials that change their stiffness in response to changes in redox state and pH. Synergistic combination of multiple properties is critically important because self-healing is essential for delivery of the hydrogel via a syringe, antimicrobial properties and cytocompatibility are critical for practical applications, and redox switching allows the removal of the gel upon addition of a mild reductant or drug release in response to reactive oxygen species (ROS). Toward this goal, three classes of stimuli-responsive materials with self-healing properties will be designed: 1) redox-sensitive peptide hydrogels; 2) pH-responsive hydrogel to deliver fibroblast cells into wound bed; 3) hydrogels that respond to both changes in pH and ROS. This work will generate hydrogel materials for wound care and arthritis treatment and will provide tools and methods for rational design of functional materials. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.