A biodegradable antibacterial alginate/carboxymethyl chitosan/Kangfuxin sponges for promoting blood coagulation and full-thickness wound healing

Conventional wound-dressing materials with structural and functional deficiencies are not effective in promoting wound healing. The development of multifunctional wound dressings is emerging as a promising strategy to accelerate blood coagulation, inhibit bacterial infection, and trigger full-thickness wound into a regenerative process. Herein, multifunctional composite sponges were developed by incorporation of traditional Chinese medicine Kangfuxin (KFX) into alginate (AG)/carboxymethyl chitosan (CMC) via green crosslinking, electrostatic interaction, and freeze-drying methods. It is demonstrated that the AG/CMC/KFX (ACK) sponges exhibit a highly interconnected and porous structure, suitable water vapor transmittance, excellent elastic properties, antibacterial behavior, cytocompatibility, and rapid hemostasis. Further, in a rat full-thickness wounds model, the ACK sponge containing 10% KFX (ACK-10) significantly facilitates wound closure compared to the AC group and ACK sponge containing 5% and 15% KFX. Thus, the multifunctional ACK-10 composite sponge has great promise for the application of full-thickness wound healing.