Fabrication of photo-crosslinkable glycol chitosan hydrogel as a tissue adhesive

In this work, an in situ gelling system composed of glycol chitosan (GC) was fabricated and evaluated regarding its tissue-adhesive, anti-bacterial and hemostatic properties. GC conjugated with 3-(4-hydroxyphenyl) propionic acid gelled immediately after illumination with blue light in the presence of ruthenium complex. The phenolic GC hydrogel was investigated regarding its mechanical property, hydration, degradation rate, cytotoxicity, tissue adhesiveness, and hemostatic ability. The hydrogel was shown to glue two pieces of tissues tightly in an egg-membrane model. The antibiotic-incorporated hydrogel killed bacteria effectively. When the hydrogel was applied to a wound in a mouse liver model, bleeding was reduced quickly and greatly. All the promising results show that the photo-chemically crosslinkable GC hydrogel could be used as a tissue adhesive, controlled drug release, and a hemostat.