Gelatin methacrylate/carboxybetaine methacrylate hydrogels with tunable crosslinking for controlled drug release.

In this work, methacrylated gelatin (GelMA) based hydrogels were fabricated with carboxybetaine methacrylate (CBMA) to manipulate the properties of the gelatin-based hydrogels, since CBMA is a much smaller compound compared to gelatin. With the incorporation of CBMA, these hydrogels demonstrated better mechanical properties, a slower degradation rate, and a controlled drug release rate compared with the GelMA alone group. GelMA/CBMA hydrogels also showed good cell viability. As in the in vivo test, vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF)-loaded GelMA/CBMA hydrogels displayed certain degrees of angiogenesis. These results indicate that GelMA/CBMA hydrogels are biocompatible, and the properties of GelMA/CBMA hydrogels can be easily tuned with the ratio of CBMA. These characteristics make the GelMA/CBMA hydrogel a promising material for drug delivery and tissue engineering.