Hydrogel
A hydrogel is a three-dimensional, water-rich polymer network formed by physical or chemical cross-linking.
A hydrogel is a three-dimensional, water-rich polymer network formed by physical or chemical cross-linking. Its interconnected structure allows substantial water uptake while retaining a defined shape. Hydrogels can be prepared from natural polymers—including chitosan, hyaluronic acid, collagen, alginate, pectin, starch, and protein-based materials—or from synthetic polymers such as polyvinyl alcohol and Pluronic F127. Their composition, cross-link density, porosity, swelling, mechanical properties, and degradation behavior can be adjusted for biological and engineering applications.
In biomedicine, hydrogels are used as wound dressings, injectable matrices, drug-release systems, cell-encapsulation materials, and tissue-engineering scaffolds. They can provide a hydrated environment that supports cell viability, adhesion, and proliferation, while also enabling localized delivery of therapeutics. Depending on their formulation, hydrogels may respond to temperature, pH, light, or other stimuli. These properties have been investigated in contexts involving inflammation, oxidative stress, reactive oxygen species, angiogenesis, bacterial infection, and tissue repair. The recent literature represented here extends a common theme of multifunctional hydrogel design across wound healing, regenerative medicine, three-dimensional culture, sustainable materials, composite mechanics, and non-biological retrieval applications.
Rebuilt from PubMed 16 Sept 2026 · no new papers today
Where the papers sit
19 papers study hydrogel directly. The themes below are drawn from those 19. 1 new direction follows.
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Diabetic Wound Repair : Multifunctional materials are combining antibacterial or antibiofilm activity with antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, hemostatic and growth-factor delivery functions. Diabetic wound closure is the main endpoint, with mitochondrial and oxidative-stress control extending to tissue degeneration. 7 papers · 36.8%
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3D Cell and Tissue Engineering : Tunable 3D matrices are moving from cell culture toward therapeutic cell delivery and tissue repair. Local GPC3-CAR-T treatment and neural stem-cell support illustrate applications in liver cancer and traumatic brain injury. 4 papers · 21.1%
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Others — Crosslinked Biomaterial Engineering : Design priorities diverge across fibrosis-free bladder reconstruction, protein photocrosslinking, rare-earth adsorption and starch-based mechanical reinforcement. The common focus is tuning polymer networks for tissue compatibility, binding selectivity or strength rather than one clinical goal. 4 papers · 21.1%
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Others — Natural Polymer Biomaterials : Natural-polymer materials are being developed for unrelated tasks, including urinary stone-fragment retrieval, corneal neovascularization, diabetic foot-ulcer repair and sustainable biowaste-derived hydrogels. Alginate, starch, calcium and copper recur, but no shared therapeutic direction is established. 4 papers · 21.1%
Hydrogel becomes a selective chromatographic platform for rare-earth purification
The elastin-based hydrogel for rare-earth-element separation uses hydrogel not as a tissue scaffold, wound dressing, cell culture matrix, or therapeutic delivery depot, but as an active ion-exchange adsorbent. Incorporating lanmodulin into an elastin-based network gave the material selective binding and release of lanthanide ions across regeneration cycles, enabling fractionation from allanite ore containing both rare-earth and non-rare-earth components. This assigns hydrogel a distinct role as a sustainable separation and purification medium rather than as a biomedical or structural material 42734268Sep.
Recent Findings on hydrogel
Inflammatory Tissue Repair: Antibacterial activity, antioxidant protection, and immune regulation jointly improve repair in infected, diabetic, corneal, and degenerative tissues. Dual-crosslinked collagen, hyaluronic acid, and chitosan hydrogels combine hemostasis, tissue adhesion, antibacterial defense, and extracellular matrix-mimicking cues for infected wound healing 42615380Aug. Alginate-based systems deliver curcumin or bilirubin locally, reducing oxidative stress while suppressing corneal neovascularization or shifting macrophages toward the anti-inflammatory M2 phenotype 42493130Jul42493109Jul. Cellulose, konjac glucomannan, and chitosan networks add self-healing, coagulation, antioxidant, and antibacterial functions, with enhanced angiogenesis, collagen deposition, and wound closure 42493151Jul42446230Jul. Other designs target intracellular mechanisms, using cerium nanozyme activity with FPR1 blockade to restore mitophagy or artemisinin and Cu2+ to reactivate macrophage autophagy 42471059Jul42409241Jul.
Cell-Interactive Biomaterials: Injectable and photocrosslinked hydrogels are being tuned to preserve cell viability while controlling gelation, mechanics, spatial organization, and therapeutic-cell retention. A factorially optimized chitosan/β-glycerophosphate/hydroxyethyl cellulose formulation balanced room-temperature injectability with rapid gelation at 37 °C and supported tumor spheroids or BMSC networks 42525690Jul. Star-shaped polysarcosine methacrylates provided topology-dependent viscoelasticity, swelling, and compression, while digital light processing produced complex constructs containing viable MC3T3 preosteoblasts 42503779Jul. A decellularized dural extracellular matrix hydrogel reduced oxidative stress in astrocytes and improved motor recovery after traumatic brain injury, alone or with neural stem cells 42391517Jul. A thermosensitive chitosan/β-glycerophosphate/gelatin hydrogel sustained IL-15 and local GPC3-CAR T cell activity, increasing tumor infiltration and antitumor efficacy in hepatocellular carcinoma 42250289Jun.
Functional polymer networks use biological macromolecules, polysaccharides, and synthetic polymers to control adsorption, mechanics, degradation, reconstruction, and retrieval. Lanmodulin-containing elastin hydrogels selectively separated lanthanide ions from allanite ore across multiple regeneration cycles, whereas an alginate-calcium system retrieved urinary stone fragments when components were applied sequentially within the fragments 42734268Sep42698032Sep. A PCECD/GelMA hydrogel matched native bladder mechanics and supported epithelialization, improved capacity and compliance, and avoided evident fibrosis in rabbits 42600117Aug. Starch granules increased both elastic reinforcement and dynamic dissipation through polymer bundling and transient hydrogen bonding, although binary filler blends suppressed these emergent properties 42600028Aug. Fruit-peel pectin and starch hydrogels retained soil moisture for up to 12 days, while starch degraded faster than pectin 42479753Jul. Soybean protein nanofibril hydrogels showed pH-dependent photocrosslinking, with pH 8 producing the highest crosslinking efficiency and mechanical strength through amino acid oxidation and disulfide bond formation 42314887Jun.
Written from 19 PubMed abstracts, each one cited by PMID above. Published: 2026-09-11. Last written: 2026-09-16 by GPT. Drafted by language models from published abstracts; not medical advice.