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Gels
Special Issues
Advanced Hydrogels for Regenerative Medicine and Tissue Engineering (4th Edition)
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Advanced Hydrogels for Regenerative Medicine and Tissue Engineering (4th Edition)

A Special Issue of Gels (ISSN 2310-2861) belonging to the section "Gel Applications".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 October 2026 | Viewed by 2097

Editors

Dr. Wen Shi

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Internal Medicine, University of Nebraska Medical Center, Omaha, NE, USA
Interests: 3D bioprinting; hydrogels; tissue engineering; regenerative medicine; nanomedicine; drug conjugate; radiopharmaceuticals
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. Bo Liu

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Internal Medicine, University of Nebraska Medical Center, Omaha, NE, USA
Interests: hydrogels; regenerative medicine; polymer chemistry; exosomes; cryopreservation
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. Shixuan Chen

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Wenzhou Institute, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Wenzhou, China
Interests: regenerative medicine; wound healing; bone regeneration; nanofiber; biofabrication
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Tissue engineering and regenerative medicine (TERM) is a rapidly developing field aiming to fully repair or regenerate damaged tissues/organs and restore their functions by combining advancements and experiences from both engineering and medicine. Hydrogels, three-dimensional water-swollen materials, exhibit versatile features for TERM applications. In addition to common hydrogels being employed as biocompatible and minimally invasive scaffolds for loading drugs or cells, more advanced hydrogels presenting multifunctional properties play more important roles in improving treatment outcomes in TERM.

These advanced hydrogel properties include, but are not limited to, self-healing, environmental stimuli responsiveness, antibacterial, anti-inflammatory, conductivity, etc. For example, self-healing hydrogels are promising candidates for bone and cartilage tissue engineering, as their self-healing characteristics can help them better deal with load-bearing conditions in native bone and cartilage sites. Additionally, the application of antibacterial and anti-inflammatory hydrogels can significantly accelerate wound healing by modulating the microenvironments in chronic wounds. On the other hand, hydrogels are also an essential component of bioinks in 3D bioprinting due to being structurally similar to the extracellular matrix of human tissues. Through the adjustment of hydrogel components and mechanical properties, 3D bioprinted tissues/organs can better mimic native tissue structures and support cellular growth, differentiation, and function, thereby enhancing TERM efficacy. The purpose of this Special Issue is to summarize the progress achieved regarding advanced hydrogels within the TERM area and encourage the discovery of new advanced hydrogels for better tissue/organ regeneration.

Dr. Wen Shi
Dr. Bo Liu
Dr. Shixuan Chen
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-anonymized peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Gels is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2100 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • hydrogels
  • tissue engineering
  • regenerative medicine
  • 3D bioprinting
  • multifunctional
  • disease models
  • scaffolds
  • stem cells
  • extracellular matrix

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Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

27 pages, 6915 KB  
Article
Study on Berberine/Glycyrrhizic Acid Monoammonium Salt Self-Assembled Hydrogel for Diabetic Wound Healing
by Li Jia, Ailin Zhang, Jiayu Wang, Yingying Shen, Jianchang Huang and Weinan Li
Gels 2026, 12(9), 799; https://doi.org/10.3390/gels12090799 - 2 Sep 2026
Abstract
Diabetic chronic wounds face multiple intractable healing obstacles including sustained inflammation, severe infection, insufficient angiogenesis and defective collagen deposition. Current dressings fail to simultaneously relieve all these pathological defects. Herein, we constructed a carrier-free binary self-assembled Glycyrrhizic acid monoammonium salt–Berberine (GB) hydrogel composed [...] Read more.
Diabetic chronic wounds face multiple intractable healing obstacles including sustained inflammation, severe infection, insufficient angiogenesis and defective collagen deposition. Current dressings fail to simultaneously relieve all these pathological defects. Herein, we constructed a carrier-free binary self-assembled Glycyrrhizic acid monoammonium salt–Berberine (GB) hydrogel composed of berberine and glycyrrhizic acid monoammonium salt, which forms interconnected nanofiber networks via one-pot thermally assisted small-molecule co-assembly without chemical crosslinking or exogenous polymer carriers. Relying on intermolecular non-covalent interactions, this single supramolecular material integrates anti-inflammatory, broad-spectrum antibacterial, pro-angiogenic, and collagen-regenerative multifunctions, which simultaneously ameliorates multiple core pathological obstacles of diabetic wounds within one formulation. We systematically characterized its physicochemical features, biocompatibility, and antibacterial and anti-inflammatory activities, as well as in vivo wound repair performance. This hydrogel formed uniform nanofibrous architectures with favorable viscoelastic properties and pH-dependent sustained release. In vitro assays verified its outstanding biosafety, broad-spectrum bacteriostasis against Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus, and potent inhibitory effects on pro-inflammatory cytokines TNF-α and IL-6, with bacterial inhibition rates reaching ~88% against E. coli and ~70% against S. aureus. In diabetic mouse full-thickness infected wound models, the GB hydrogel simultaneously alleviated local inflammation, accelerated wound closure and facilitated ordered collagen deposition and mature microvessel formation, achieving a 73.10% wound closure rate at day 7 and 58.01% collagen deposition fraction at day 14, thus exhibiting equivalent or superior repair capacity compared with commercial hydrogel dressings. This carrier-free supramolecular system based on natural herbal small molecules provides a safe, convenient, and integrated therapeutic strategy for diabetic infected chronic wounds, with promising clinical translation potential. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advanced Hydrogels for Regenerative Medicine and Tissue Engineering (4th Edition))
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23 pages, 8103 KB  
Article
Multifunctional Silk Fibroin Hydrogel with Antibacterial and Regenerative Properties for Accelerated Wound Healing
by Yanjiao Wu, Jiayue Chen, Luyao Han, Yiqiong Zhang and Li Wei
Gels 2026, 12(5), 417; https://doi.org/10.3390/gels12050417 - 10 May 2026
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 1371
Abstract
The emergence of multifunctional wound dressings represents a significant transformation in the care of cutaneous tissue injuries, providing advanced solutions that surpass traditional dressings. This study is poised to fabricate multifunctional hydrogels through dual-dynamic cross-linking, integrating antibacterial and antioxidant properties, which are capable [...] Read more.
The emergence of multifunctional wound dressings represents a significant transformation in the care of cutaneous tissue injuries, providing advanced solutions that surpass traditional dressings. This study is poised to fabricate multifunctional hydrogels through dual-dynamic cross-linking, integrating antibacterial and antioxidant properties, which are capable of accelerating wound healing while improving therapeutic outcomes. The hydrogel, which exhibits excellent adhesion, rapid self-healing ability, and on-demand removability, was synthesized employing poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA)–borax as the backbone, followed by the incorporation of silk fibroin (SF), tannic acid (TA), and chitosan (CS). Total saponins of Panax notoginseng flower buds (PNF) with anti-inflammatory and angiogenic properties were loaded in porous structural materials yielding the PBCTS@PNF hydrogel. The prepared hydrogel exhibited outstanding antioxidant properties and cytocompatibility, along with favorable antibacterial capabilities, achieving inhibition rates of 84.30 ± 2.34% against Escherichia coli (E. coli) and 98.12 ± 0.76% against Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus), respectively. Animal experiments demonstrated that PBCTS@PNF significantly reduced inflammation and promoted multidimensional tissue regeneration, encompassing re-epithelialization, neovascularization, and hair follicle regeneration, along with ordered collagen matrix organization, leading to substantially accelerated wound healing. The multifunctional PBCTS@PNF hydrogel provides a potent bioengineered therapeutic platform for wound healing management through the synergistic interplay among antibacterial, anti-inflammatory, and tissue regenerative functionalities. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advanced Hydrogels for Regenerative Medicine and Tissue Engineering (4th Edition))
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