Abstract
Presently, notwithstanding the progress regarding wound-healing management, the treatment of the majority of skin lesions still represents a serious challenge for biomedical and pharmaceutical industries. Thus, the attention of the researchers has turned to the development of novel materials based on cellulose derivatives. Cellulose derivatives are semi-synthetic biopolymers, which exhibit high solubility in water and represent an advantageous alternative to water-insoluble cellulose. These biopolymers possess excellent properties, such as biocompatibility, biodegradability, sustainability, non-toxicity, non-immunogenicity, thermo-gelling behavior, mechanical strength, abundance, low costs, antibacterial effect, and high hydrophilicity. They have an efficient ability to absorb and retain a large quantity of wound exudates in the interstitial sites of their networks and can maintain optimal local moisture. Cellulose derivatives also represent a proper scaffold to incorporate various bioactive agents with beneficial therapeutic effects on skin tissue restoration. Due to these suitable and versatile characteristics, cellulose derivatives are attractive and captivating materials for wound-healing applications. This review presents an extensive overview of recent research regarding promising cellulose derivatives-based materials for the development of multiple biomedical and pharmaceutical applications, such as wound dressings, drug delivery devices, and tissue engineering.
Highlights
Skin is the largest and the main organ that forms the body covering, with a complex structure of tissues, and creates an exterior defense barrier, which protects the internal organs from mechanical impairments, radiation, chemicals, and foreign invaders [1]
This review has focused on different types of wound dressing based on cellulose derivatives as biopolymeric scaffolds, and various bioactive agents, from plant extracts to chemical drugs
We have considered the cellulose ethers derivatives (NaCMC, HPMC, methylcellulose lose (MC), HEC, EC, and HPC)
Summary
Skin is the largest and the main organ that forms the body covering, with a complex structure of tissues, and creates an exterior defense barrier, which protects the internal organs from mechanical impairments, radiation, chemicals, and foreign invaders (bacteria and viruses) [1]. To alleviate the pain and inflammation, which accompany the wounds, analgesic and anti-inflammatory drugs are prescribed Because of their side effects on the gastrointestinal system when they are administered orally [23], a more advantageous and simple treatment is to apply on the lesion site a wound dressing [24]. Cellulose derivatives have proper and optimal applicability to develop novel wound dressings that can enhance wound healing, obtained by substituting the hydroxyl groups from cellulose molecule with different alkyl groups [26]. They exhibit high solubility in water and represent a feasible alternative to water-insoluble cellulose. Besides wound-dressings development, cellulose derivatives are promising biomaterials for tissue engineering, drug delivery, hemodialysis, osseointegration, and biosensors [29]
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