Nb2CTx MXene coating with inhibition of oxidative stress prepared by Marangoni effect for hemodialysis therapy

Abstract

Oxidative stress is an important risk factor for end-stage renal disease (ESRD), that can further aggravate the disease during dialysis of patients and eventually lead to various complications. Here, Nb2CTx MXene was deposited using the Marangoni force to tightly stack them on the polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) substrate membrane, conferring the alleviation of oxidative stress. Owing to the excellent antioxidant activity of Nb2CTx MXenes, PVDF/Nb2CTx membranes can scavenge a wide range of reactive oxygen species (ROS) to inhibit advanced glycation end-products (AGEs). Additionally, the functionalized membranes modulated the intracellular antioxidant enzyme activity and maintained an intracellular oxidative-antioxidant system balance. In the simulated dialysis experiment, the optimised hemodialysis membrane (MMX-0.2 membrane) exhibited the high clearance of middle and small uraemic toxins (72.6% of lysozyme and 90.0% of urea) owing to the unique lamellar structure of Nb2CTx. Protein adhesion experiments showed that Nb2CTx MXenes improved membrane hydrophilicity and hindered protein adsorption. The functionalized membranes exhibited excellent hemocompatibility and cytocompatibility, meeting the biocompatibility requirements for hemodialysis membranes. In this work constructed PVDF/Nb2CTx functionalized membranes with excellent oxidative stress inhibition and high dialysis performance are proposed as a novel hemodialysis membrane preparation method to improve patient prognosis.