Development and in vitro evaluation of a polymeric matrix of jellyfish collagen-human stem cell secretome-polyurethane for wound healing

Wound healing is a biological process that requires a complex regulation to maintaining the function of skin. However, many factors can alter this process, resulting in non-healing wounds. An option for the treatment of this kind of wound is the use of stem cell secretome (S), since it has been shown that it promotes the tissue repair-regeneration processes. For this reason, this work focused on develop a polymeric matrix in hydrogel state, based on jellyfish collagen (CLG), polyurethane and S from mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) from human amniotic membrane, and its in vitro evaluation in wound closure. Two types of polyurethane matrix were analyzed; the first one was crosslinking with polyurethane derived from hexamethylene diisocyanate (HDI), and the second one was crosslinking with polyurethane derived from isophorone diisocyanate (IPDI), giving rise to two different polymeric matrices, CLG-P(HDI)-S and CLG-P(IPDI)-S containing 0.5 wt.% of S for each matrix. The results suggest that the incorporation to S in the polymeric matrices generates interactions in the hydrogel state matrices, promoting amorphous surfaces, which seems to indicate that the S is encapsulated by physical or electrostatic interactions with polymeric chains. The CLG-P(HDI)-S showed a spherical structure, while the CLG-P(IPDI)-S exhibited a planar structure, which is related to the chemical structure of polyurethane crosslinker, these structural characteristics gave the polymeric matrices, suitable physicochemical, mechanical and biological properties for accelerating the wound healing process in an in vitro scratch assay, and thus could be a promising scaffold for wound management for non-healing wounds. Graphical abstract