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Spinal cord injury (SCI) often leads to persistent functional deficits due to loss of neurons and glia after injury. Hemisection spinal cord injury (HSCI) is a special type of SCI. The most important difference between HSCI and SCI is the occurrence of spinal cord dissection. Therefore, a calcium alginate hydrogel combined with dental pulp stem cells (DPSCs) and fibroblast growth factor 21 (FGF21) was designed based on the principle that cadherin expression is regulated by calcium ion concentration. Each element in Ca2+@Alg-FGF21 + DPSC hydrogel can exert different effects 1). calcium ions can regulate cadherin to achieve self-adhesion; 2). alginic acid can absorb calcium ions to prevent calcium overload induced injury; 3) FGF21 can regulate microenvironment; 4). DPSCs can supplement exogenous neurons. The multi-factorially comprehensive effects were hypothesized to improve the HSCI recovery. It was revealed in our study that Ca2+@Alg-FGF21 + DPSC hydrogel could effectively promote the recovery after spinal cord hemisection in mice via regulating apoptosis and autophagy, providing potential clues and cues of using Ca2+@Alg-FGF21 + DPSC hydrogel for HSCI treatment.

Gauze is the leading dressing for wound management. However, infection and tissue adhesion pose serious challenges to the application of gauzes. Herein, inspired by the self-cleaning property of lotus leaf, we develop a novel antiadhesive and antibacterial gauze. The gauze, named Lotus@Gauze, is fabricated by decorating an ordinary medical gauze sequentially with polydopamine, perfluorocarbon and silver nanoparticle to obtain a lotus leaf-mimic surface structure. Lotus@Gauze exhibits excellent antiadhesive and antibacterial effects, and its antibacterial ability is enhanced under NIR irradiation due to the photothermal effect of polydopamine. Furthermore, in vivo results reveal that, in comparison with clinically available antiadhesive or antibacterial gauzes, Lotus@Gauze shows better efficacy in promoting infectious wound regeneration due to its low tissue adhesion and effective bactericidal activity. Overall, this study explores a new attempt to overcome the challenge of tissue adhesion and infection by integrating antiadhesive and antibacterial properties into one piece of simple gauze.