Project Summary
Over 6 million people in the United States are afflicted by chronic ulcers and this number is expected to
grow. Wound healing is impaired in these patients, who are often inflicted with other diseases (i.e., diabetes,
venous disease, or arterial disease), receiving anti-inflammatory steroid treatment, or receiving chemo- or
radiotherapy for cancer. Chronic ulcers can negatively affect patient quality of life and productivity and are a
substantial financial burden to the health care system. Patients typically require extended periods of
hospitalization and may require over 26 weeks for full recovery. Treatment of diabetic ulcers and related
amputations in the U.S. totaled over $10 billion in 2011. Current treatments of non-infected ulcers are costly
and have demonstrated mixed results. Most importantly, these treatments do not actively prevent infection,
which can often complicate healing and affect long-term stable wound resolution.
In the current proposal, we seek to manipulate a unique bioinspired redox chemistry found in mussel
adhesive proteins to create a novel, multifunctional nanocomposite adhesive that can potentially promote
wound healing while minimizing infection. There are three main objectives to this proposal. Objective 1:
characterize the effect of adhesive composition on adhesive performance. Objective 2: demonstrate the
adhesive’s ability in promoting healing and prevent infection in culture. Objective 3: verify candidate
adhesives’ ability to promote dermal wound healing in a diabetic mouse model. Successful completion of the
proposed work will lead to a follow-on project aimed at evaluating the adhesive’s antimicrobial properties and
its ability in treating animals with infected wounds.