Peptide-based hydrogel shows promise for tissue and organ repair

Combining biomedical precision and nature-inspired engineering, a team led by the University of Ottawa has created a jelly-like material that shows enormous potential for rapidly repairing a wide range of damaged organs and tissues in the human body.

Cutting-edge research led by Dr. Emilio I. Alarcon, an associate professor at the University of Ottawa's Faculty of Medicine, could impact the lives of millions of people in the future with peptide hydrogels that could close skin wounds, deliver therapeutics to damaged heart muscle, and repair damaged heart muscle. Cornea.

“We use peptides to create therapeutic solutions. The team is taking inspiration from nature to develop simple solutions for wound closure and tissue repair,” says Dr. Alarcon, a scientist and director of the BioEngineering and Therapeutic Solutions (BEaTS) group at the University of Ottawa Heart Institute, whose pioneering research is developing new materials with the ability to tissue regeneration.

Peptides are molecules found in living organisms, and hydrogels are aqueous materials with a jelly-like texture that have proven useful for therapeutic purposes.

The approach taken in the study, published in Advanced Functional Materials and conducted jointly with Dr. Erik Suuronen and Dr. Mark Ruel, is unique. Most hydrogels studied in tissue engineering are animal-derived and protein-based materials, but the biomaterial created by the collaborative team is reinforced with engineered peptides. This makes it more applicable in clinical practice.

Dr. Ruel, a professor in the Department of Cellular and Molecular Medicine at the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Ottawa and chair of research in the Department of Cardiac Surgery at the University of Ottawa Heart Institute, said the study's findings could be revolutionary.

“Despite millennia of evolution, the human response to wound healing still remains imperfect,” says Dr. Ruel. “We see irregular scarring from skin incisions to eye injuries to cardiac repair after a myocardial infarction. Doctors Alarcon, Suuronen and the rest of our team have been focused on this problem for almost two decades. Dr. Alarcón's publication in Advanced Functional Materials represents a new way to make wound healing, organ healing, and even basic scarring after surgery much more therapeutically manageable and therefore optimized for human health."

Synthesized Peptides for Instant Soft Tissue Repair. Advanced Functional Materials (2024). DOI: 10.1002/adfm.202402564

Indeed, the key is the ability to modulate the peptide biomaterial. The University of Ottawa team’s hydrogels are designed to be tunable, making this durable material adaptable for use in a wide range of tissues. Essentially, the two-component recipe can be tweaked to increase adhesiveness or decrease other components depending on the part of the body requiring repair.

“We were very surprised by the range of applications our materials could achieve,” says Dr. Alarcon. “Our technology offers an integrated solution that is customizable depending on the target tissue.”

Dr. Alarcon also notes that the research data suggests that the therapeutic effects of biomimetic hydrogels are highly effective, and their use is significantly simpler and more cost-effective than other regenerative approaches.

The materials were developed at low cost and in a scalable format, which is extremely important for many large-scale biomedical applications. The team also developed a rapid screening system that significantly reduced development costs and testing times.

“This significant reduction in cost and time not only makes our material more economically viable, but also accelerates its potential for clinical use,” says Dr. Alarcon.

What are the next steps for the research team? They will conduct large animal trials in preparation for human testing. To date, heart and skin tests have been conducted in rodents, and corneal work has been done ex vivo.