ABSTRACT
PURPOSE: This study was designed to compare the wound healing effect of silk fibroin, alginate and fibroin/ alginate blend sponge with clinically used Nu gauze in a rat skin defect model. METHODS: Two full thickness excisions were made on the back of Sprague-Dawley rat. The excised wound was covered with either of the silk fibroin(SF), alginate (SA), or fibroin/alginate blend sponge(SF/SA). On the postoperative days of 3, 7, 10 and 14, the wound area was calculated by image analysis software. At the same time, a skin wound tissue was biopsied. RESULTS: Healing time 50% (HT(50)) of SF/SA sponge treated group was dramatically reduced as compared with that of control treatment. We also found that the HT50 of SF/SA sponge was significantly decreased as compared with either those of SF or SA treatment. Furthermore, SF/SA treatment significantly increased the size of epithelialization and collagen deposition as well as the number of PCNA positive cells on epidermal basement membrane as comapred with those of control treatment. CONCLUSION: Our results suggest that the wound healing effect of SF/SA blend sponge is the best among other treatments including SF and SA during the whole wound healing period.