Anti-Inflammatory Salidroside Delivery from Chitin Hydrogels for NIR-II Image-Guided Therapy of Atopic Dermatitis

Shengnan He; Fang Xie; Wuyue Su; Haibin Luo; Deliang Chen; Jie Cai; Xuechuan Hong

doi:10.3390/jfb14030150

Anti-Inflammatory Salidroside Delivery from Chitin Hydrogels for NIR-II Image-Guided Therapy of Atopic Dermatitis

J Funct Biomater. 2023 Mar 8;14(3):150. doi: 10.3390/jfb14030150.

Authors

Shengnan He¹, Fang Xie², Wuyue Su¹, Haibin Luo³, Deliang Chen⁴, Jie Cai^{2

5}, Xuechuan Hong^{1

6}

Affiliations

¹ State Key Laboratory of Virology, College of Science, Research Center for Ecology, Laboratory of Extreme Environmental Biological Resources and Adaptive Evolution, Medical College, Tibet University, Lhasa 850000, China.
² Hubei Engineering Centre of Natural Polymers-Based Medical Materials, College of Chemistry & Molecular Sciences, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072, China.
³ Key Laboratory of Tropical Biological Resources of Ministry of Education, School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Hainan University, Haikou 570228, China.
⁴ Jiangxi Key Laboratory of Organo-Pharmaceutical Chemistry, Chemistry and Chemical Engineering College, Gannan Normal University, Ganzhou 341000, China.
⁵ Institute of Hepatobiliary Diseases, Zhongnan Hospital of Wuhan University, Wuhan 430071, China.
⁶ Wuhan University Shenzhen Research Institute, Shenzhen 518057, China.

Abstract

Atopic dermatitis (AD) is the most common heterogeneous skin disease. Currently, effective primary prevention approaches that hamper the occurrence of mild to moderate AD have not been reported. In this work, the quaternized β-chitin dextran (QCOD) hydrogel was adopted as a topical carrier system for topical and transdermal delivery of salidroside for the first time. The cumulative release value of salidroside reached ~82% after 72 h at pH 7.4, while in vitro drug release experiments proved that QCOD@Sal (QCOD@Salidroside) has a good, sustained release effect, and the effect of QCOD@Sal on atopic dermatitis mice was further investigated. QCOD@Sal could promote skin repair or AD by modulating inflammatory factors TNF-α and IL-6 without skin irritation. The present study also evaluated NIR-II image-guided therapy (NIR-II, 1000-1700 nm) of AD using QCOD@Sal. The treatment process of AD was monitored in real-time, and the extent of skin lesions and immune factors were correlated with the NIR-II fluorescence signals. These attractive results provide a new perspective for designing NIR-II probes for NIR-II imaging and image-guided therapy with QCOD@Sal.

Keywords: Rhodiola rosea; atopic dermatitis; imaging in the second near-infrared window (NIR-II); the quaternized β-chitin/dextran hydrogel; treatment.

Grants and funding

This work was partially supported by grants from NSFC (82273796, 82111530209, 52173105), Special Funds for Guiding Local Science and Technology Development of Central Government (XZ202202YD0021C, XZ202001YD0028C), Tibet Autonomous Region COVID-19 Prevention and Control Programs for Science and Technology Development (XZ202201ZY0046G), Shenzhen Science and Technology Research Grant (JCYJ20220530140605012), Guangdong Basic and Applied Basic Research Foundation (2023A1515012649), the Double Thousand Plan of Jiangxi Province (jxsq2020102130), Hubei Province Scientific and Technical Innovation Key Project (2020BAB058, 2020BCA079), and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central University.