Fabrication And Characterization of a Drug-Loaded Conductive Scaffold Based On Chitosan/ Polyaniline Hydrogel For Cardiac Tissue Engineering Application

Heart tissue repair and regeneration remain critical challenges in cardiovascular medicine. Myocardial infarction, heart failure, and cardiac arrhythmias significantly damage heart tissue, impacting its electrical properties and overall function. The main goal of cardiac tissue engineering focuses on developing effective strategies to repair and regenerate damaged cardiac tissue and promote cardiomyogenesis. The hydrogel scaffold can mimic an extracellular matrix environment that shows a porous and interconnected structure, allowing the exchange of nutrients and metabolites, facilitating cell migration, and loading drugs to promote tissue regeneration. Chitosan-based hydrogels have been widely investigated for tissue engineering due to their biocompatibility, biodegradability, and ability to form porous structures. Moreover, chitosan can be combined with other polymers to produce functional composite materials. polyaniline (PANi) offers electrical conductivity, enhancing cell proliferation and differentiation. In this study, we fabricated a conductive hydrogel made of chitosan (CS) and polyaniline (PANI) to present several properties together, and since conventional polyaniline dopants are toxic, tannic acid as polyaniline dopant, hydrogel crosslinker, which has medicinal and antioxidant properties, has been used for heart tissue engineering. Chitosan was dissolved in a suitable solvent, acetic acid, within ۲۴ hours. Then aniline was added to the mixture and tannic acid was dissolved in water, and then by controlling the pH of the solution, it was added dropwise to the mixture solution, and finally, ammonium persulfate (APS) was introduced to start the polymerization of aniline. Adequate time was given for the polymerization process and resulted in the formation of a conductive chitosan/PANi hydrogel with tannic acid cross-linkers. Various parameters, including polymer concentration and polymerization conditions, were optimized to achieve optimal mechanical strength and porosity. The physicochemical properties of the composite hydrogel were determined using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and conductivity tests. The Cs/PAni hydrogel scaffold exhibited good conductivity and mechanical strength. Characterization confirmed the successful integration of PAni and the structural integrity of the hydrogel. We developed a conductive and biocompatible Cs/PAni hydrogel scaffold doped with tannic acid, presenting a promising candidate for cardiac tissue engineering.

کلیدواژه ها:

Cardiac tissue engineering ، Chitosan ، Polyaniline ، Conductive hydrogel ، Tannic acid ، Biocompatible dopant