One Stone Three Birds: Silver Sulfadiazine Modulates the Stability and Dynamics of Hydrogels for Infected Wound Healing

Dynamic covalent bond hydrogels have demonstrated significant application potential in biomedical fields for their dynamic reversibility. However, the contradiction between the stability and dynamics of the hydrogel restricts its application. Here, utilizing silver sulfadiazine (AgSD) as a catalyst, hyaluronic acid-based hydrogels are constructed through imine bond crosslinking and incorporated disulfide bonds within the same crosslinking chain. It is found that AgSD can accelerate the formation of imine crosslinking bonds to improve the stability of hydrogels, thereby shortening the gelation time by approximate to 36.9 times, enhancing compression strength and adhesion strength by approximate to 2.4 times and 1.7 times, respectively, while inhibiting swelling and degradation rates to approximate to 2.1 times and 3.7 times. Besides, AgSD can coordinate with disulfide bonds to enhance the dynamics of hydrogel, enhancing the hydrogel self-healing efficiency by approximate to 2.3 times while reducing the relaxation time by approximate to 25.1 times. Significantly, AgSD imparts remarkable antibacterial properties to the hydrogel, thereby effectively facilitating the healing of bacterial infected wounds. Consequently, introducing AgSD enables hydrogels to possess concurrent stability, dynamics, and antibacterial properties. This strategy of regulating hydrogels by introducing AgSD provides a valuable reference for the application of dynamic covalent bonds. From the perspective of addressing the contradiction between stability and dynamics in dynamic hydrogels, a hydrogel network is constructed through imine bond crosslinking and introduced disulfide bonds within the same crosslinking chain, while incorporating AgSD as a catalyst. AgSD can simultaneously improve hydrogels' stability and dynamics, endowing them antibacterial properties, ultimately achieving the strategy of 'one stone three birds'. image