Superhydrophilic Coating Platform Supported Synergistic Antimicrobial Ability for Enhanced Wound Healing

Abstract

Nowadays, medical device infections constitute a major healthcare burden, particular administration of combating bacterial infections is of significance. In this work, robust mussel-inspired superhydrophilic coating was established, mainly based on the rapid polydopamine formation in the presence of sodium periodate. The stable superhydrophilicity was maintained due to the hydrophilic chemical components and nanoparticles-stacked surface topography. The superhydrophilicity allowed the coating to interfere with the protein adsorption effectively, and resulted in impressive antifouling performance. Moreover, due to the existence of aromatic catechol moieties, utilizing π-π stacking/hydrophobic interactions antibiotics (e.g. norfloxacin and cephalexin) were synchronously assembled into the superhydrophilic coating, respectively, endowing the surface with antibacterial ability. Interestingly, the embedded antibiotics presented meaningful sustained release with less than 15% released amount even after 30 days incubation, suggesting effective and safe antibacterial ability in a low dose-dependent manner, due to the antifouling supported 'release killing' of bacteria. The in vivo cutaneous wound healing evaluation further strongly demonstrated the synchronous effect of anti-infection and promoting wound healing. Such superhydrophilicity supported antifouling is also believed to open a new window for modifying biomedical devices with combined wound healing, antibacterial, and antifouling properties.