title: Biodegradable hyaluronic acid hydrogels to control release of dexamethasone through aqueous Diels-Alder chemistry for adipose tissue engineering.
abstract: A robust synthetic strategy of biopolymer-based hydrogels has been developed where hyaluronic acid derivatives reacted through aqueous Diels-Alder chemistry without the involvement of chemical catalysts, allowing for control and sustain release of dexamethasone. To conjugate the hydrogel, furan and maleimide functionalized hyaluronic acid were synthesized, respectively, as well as furan functionalized dexamethasone, for the covalent immobilization. Chemical structure, gelation time, morphologies, swelling kinetics, weight loss, compressive modulus and dexamethasone release of the hydrogel system in PBS at 37°C were studied. The results demonstrated that the aqueous Diels-Alder chemistry provides an extremely selective reaction and proceeds with high efficiency for hydrogel conjugation and covalent immobilization of dexamethasone. Cell culture results showed that the dexamethasone immobilized hydrogel was noncytotoxic and preserved proliferation of entrapped human adipose-derived stem cells. This synthetic approach uniquely allows for the direct fabrication of biologically functionalized gel scaffolds with ideal structures for adipose tissue engineering, which provides a competitive alternative to conventional conjugation techniques such as copper mediated click chemistry.
authors.affiliation: School of Materials Science and Engineering, Nanjing University of Science and Technology, Nanjing, China.
authors.forename: Ming
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Fan
authors.affiliation: School of Materials Science and Engineering, Nanjing University of Science and Technology, Nanjing, China.
authors.forename: Ye
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Ma
authors.affiliation: School of Materials Science and Engineering, Nanjing University of Science and Technology, Nanjing, China.
authors.forename: Ziwei
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.affiliation: School of Materials Science and Engineering, Nanjing University of Science and Technology, Nanjing, China.
authors.forename: Jiahui
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Mao
authors.affiliation: School of Materials Science and Engineering, Nanjing University of Science and Technology, Nanjing, China. Electronic address: hptan@njust.edu.cn.
authors.forename: Huaping
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Tan
authors.affiliation: School of Material Engineering, Jinling Institute of Technology, Nanjing, China.
authors.forename: Xiaohong
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Hu
mesh_terms: D000273:Adipose Tissue; D003692:Delayed-Action Preparations / Q000737:chemistry; D003907:Dexamethasone / Q000737:chemistry / Q000493:pharmacokinetics; D006801:Humans; D006820:Hyaluronic Acid / Q000737:chemistry*; D020100:Hydrogels / Q000737:chemistry*; D023822:Tissue Engineering
chemical_list: D003692:Delayed-Action Preparations; D020100:Hydrogels; D003907:Dexamethasone; D006820:Hyaluronic Acid
keywords: Cell scaffold; Drug delivery; Hyaluronic acid; Injectable hydrogel; Tissue engineering