Thermosensitive heparin-poloxamer hydrogel encapsulated bFGF and NGF to treat spinal cord injury.
Abstract
The application of growth factors (GFs) for treating chronic spinal cord injury (SCI) has been shown to promote axonal regeneration and functional recovery. However, direct administration of GFs is limited by their rapid degradation and dilution at the injured sites. Moreover, SCI recovery is a multifactorial process that requires multiple GFs to participate in tissue regeneration. Based on these facts, controlled delivery of multiple growth factors (GFs) to lesion areas is becoming an attractive strategy for repairing SCI. Presently, we developed a GFs-based delivery system (called GFs-HP) that consisted of basic fibroblast growth factor (bFGF), nerve growth factor (NGF) and heparin-poloxamer (HP) hydrogel through self-assembly mode. This GFs-HP was a kind of thermosensitive hydrogel that was suitable for orthotopic administration in vivo. Meanwhile, a 3D porous structure of this hydrogel is commonly used to load large amounts of GFs. After single injection of GFs-HP into the lesioned spinal cord, the sustained release of NGF and bFGF from HP could significantly improve neuronal survival, axon regeneration, reactive astrogliosis suppression and locomotor recovery, when compared with the treatment of free GFs or HP. Moreover, w...Continue Reading
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