Design and fabrication of a new chitosan based wound dressing in combination with carboxylated Polyethylene glycol

Abstract

a successful wound dressing is required to show acceptable structural properties. Here we aimed in developing a new wound dressing using chitosan in combination with polyethylene glycol (PEG) for mechanical and structural properties enhancement the percentages of polymers and method of mixing were major parameters to obtain a proper porous structure with appropriate properties and economical advantage. Hence we used wide ranges of chitosan percentage and molecular weight of PEG, and two methods of fabrication through casting and freeze drying to obtain a novel wound dressing with enhanced properties. After synthesis, different material properties were examined including swelling, biodegradability. Furthermore, samples were mechanically characterized by elastic moduli parameters. Samples with 70% and 50% of chitosan and PEG molecular weight of 2000, synthesized by casting method were selected after meeting the adequate requirements as proper candidates for the wound dressing. Their porous structure with small size pores provided an appropriate environment to enable absorbance drainage and transmission of vapor. They showed superb antibacterial property with high reduction rates of bacterial colonies of E.coli and S.aureus. Moreover, they indicated non-toxicity for L929 fibroblast cells with over 98% viability in MTT assay. Considering appropriate physical, structural and biological properties, the selected samples were introduced as wound dressing candidates.