Twice as fast
Doctors from the USA have created a gel that accelerates wound healing
Molecular biologists from Stanford (USA) have created a gel that doubles the speed of tightening cuts and other wounds, and successfully tested its work on mice. The results of their experiments were presented in the journal Advances in Wound Care (O'Rourke et al., Fidgetin-Like 2 siRNA Enhances the Wound Healing Capability of a Surfactant Polymer Dressing – VM).
"The wounds not only tightened faster, but there was a real regeneration of the tissue – the cut not only "overgrown" with skin, but also hair sacs and other glands appeared inside it. Such a cream can be used not only for the treatment of cuts, but also for severe combat wounds and chronic wounds," says David Sharp from Stanford University (in a press release from Albert Einstein College of Medicine Novel Combination Therapy Promotes Wound Healing – VM).
According to scientists, all tissues of the human body and other animals produce a small electric field. This field, as biologists believe today, plays an important role in controlling the movement of cells during wound healing and body growth. For example, the appearance of a cut or scratch leads to a "collapse" of this field at the point where the wound was inflicted, which causes future skin and muscle cells to migrate in the direction of this "electric pit".
Biologists have been trying for a long time to figure out how to change the work of this field so that future skin cells migrate faster to the cut site and tighten the wound earlier, without leaving noticeable scars. Recently, biologists have discovered several genes that "conduct" this process, and have successfully tested their work on mice and other animals.
For example, three years ago, Sharp and his colleagues discovered that the FL2 gene plays a similar role – it "slows down" the movement of new skin cells moving towards the "electric pit". This discovery prompted them to think that temporarily blocking his work would accelerate the healing of the wound.
Guided by this idea, Stanford biologists created a set of short RNA molecules that interfere with the reading of copies of FL2 by ribosomes, cellular "factories" for assembling proteins, and added them to one of the popular bactericidal gels that doctors impregnate gauze and bandages with.
Scientists have tested the work of this cream on mice that have experienced severe burns or skin cuts. Observing the changes in their condition for two weeks, Sharp and his colleagues evaluated the effectiveness of the "pure" gel, as well as its combination with RNA molecules.
As these experiments showed, the suppression of FL2 caused wounds to heal about twice as fast as with natural healing of cuts or the use of pure gel. Thanks to this, absolutely all mice who received such treatment got rid of all traces of burns and cuts just two weeks after the start of the experiment, while only 30% of the remaining mice managed to recover.
Now, as the scientists note, they are conducting similar experiments on pig skin, and are preparing to send a request for clinical trials on volunteers to the US regulatory authorities.
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