Elastin-like protein-based adhesives for soft tissue applications

Abstract

When tissues are damaged, whether through trauma, surgery, or disease, the body's natural healing process aims to repair the injured site. However, in many cases, this process alone is insufficient to fully restore tissue integrity and function. Sutures or staples can be applied to join tissues together, but these approaches can only be applied in easily accessible wounds. Additionally, these methods sometimes suffer from drawbacks, e.g. tissue tearing. Tissue adhesives are more practical when considering applications such as minimally invasive surgery. The ideal tissue adhesive should be adhesive under physiological conditions (i.e., in wet conditions) and should resemble the surrounding tissue as closely as possible, while preventing bacterial colonization. Protein-based hydrogels would therefore be an interesting material to meet these requirements due to their tunable properties and their biocompatibility. In this project, dynamically cross-linked hydrogels based on elastin-like proteins (ELPs) will be modified in such a way whereby the proteins contain catechol-rich adhesive domains inspired by mussel foot protein-5 (Mefp‑5). The combination of catechol-based adhesive domains with dynamic covalent chemistry is expected to provide an additional energy dissipation mechanism, resulting in improved tissue adhesion under dynamic conditions.