Photocuring and Gelatin-Based Antibacterial Hydrogel for Skin Care

The development of moisturizing, antibacterial, and biocompatiblemultifunctional hydrogels is essential to protect skin and promoteskin defects recovery. Gelatin has admired potential to be appliedfor skin care as a hydrogel in virtue of its hydrophilic biocompatibleand biodegradable properties. In this study, triclosan-grafted gelatinand photo-cross-linkable methacrylated gelatin were synthesized andthen combined to construct the semi-interpenetrating network and antibacterialhydrogels with the aid of a visible blue light. The antimicrobialtest demonstrated that the resulting hydrogel obtained excellent inactivationcapacity against E. coli, S. aureus, T. rubrum, and C. albicans withsterilizing rates of 99.998%, 99.998%, 99.19%, and 99.64%, respectively.In addition, the cytotoxicity, hemolysis, skin irritation, and ratskin wound healing experiments proved the good biocompatibility ofthe hydrogel. Therefore, this investigation sheds light on the developmentof multifunctional hydrogels in skin care.