Maritech® fucoidan in promising wound-healing research
A research collaboration between Marinova and the University of South Australia, led by Associate Professor David Beattie and Dr Marta Krasowska, has yielded an exciting new technique that could give rise to the development of specialised fucoidan wound dressings.
Now published in the Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics journal, researchers used fucoidan to create a special material known as a polyelectrolyte multilayer (PEM) – formed by depositing alternating layers of positively and negatively charged polymers. Maritech® fucoidan extracted from Fucus vesiculosus was layered with chitosan (a polysaccharide derived from the tough outer skeleton of shellfish) to successfully form PEM material. It was found that the molecular weight of fucoidan greatly altered the structure of the PEM, affecting hydration, elasticity, and thus the capacity for small molecules to move through the material.
This novel technique could be utilised to develop a variety of specialised wound dressings to allow proteins and other functional molecules to migrate from the dressing onto a wound site to accelerate healing.
Previous research conducted by Marinova has demonstrated that Maritech® fucoidan significantly increases gene expression essential for wound-healing. One particular experiment, led by Marinova’s Chief Scientist Dr Helen Fitton, showed that Maritech® fucoidan more than doubled wound-healing gene expression within four hours of application.