Directed Self-assembly of Herbal Small Molecules into Sustained Release Hydrogels for Treating Neural Inflammation

Overview

Journal Nat Commun

Specialty Biology

Date 2019 Apr 10

PMID 30962431

Citations 80

Authors

Jun Zheng

Rong Fan

Huiqiong Wu

Honghui Yao

Yujie Yan

Jiamiao Liu

Lu Ran

Zhifang Sun

Lunzhao Yi

Li Dang

Pingping Gan

Piao Zheng

Tilong Yang

Yi Zhang

Tao Tang

Yang Wang

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Self-assembling natural drug hydrogels formed without structural modification and able to act as carriers are of interest for biomedical applications. A lack of knowledge about natural drug gels limits there current application. Here, we report on rhein, a herbal natural product, which is directly self-assembled into hydrogels through noncovalent interactions. This hydrogel shows excellent stability, sustained release and reversible stimuli-responses. The hydrogel consists of a three-dimensional nanofiber network that prevents premature degradation. Moreover, it easily enters cells and binds to toll-like receptor 4. This enables rhein hydrogels to significantly dephosphorylate IκBα, inhibiting the nuclear translocation of p65 at the NFκB signalling pathway in lipopolysaccharide-induced BV2 microglia. Subsequently, rhein hydrogels alleviate neuroinflammation with a long-lasting effect and little cytotoxicity compared to the equivalent free-drug in vitro. This study highlights a direct self-assembly hydrogel from natural small molecule as a promising neuroinflammatory therapy.

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