Fig. 7: Evaluation of the effect of HUVEC^vegf165+-laden hydrogel on rat diabetic wounds.

A Experimental scheme. This figure was created with BioRender.com and has been granted a publication license. ip, intraperitoneal injection; LASCA, laser speckle contrast analysis. B Diabetic wound healing processes were recorded after the three treatments. Yellow paper as a size control is in a diameter of 1 cm. C Re-depiction of wound healing processes. D Comparison of wound closure rates following the three treatments. n = 15 rats/group on day 1; n = 10 rats/group on days 4 and 7; n = 5 rats/group on days 10 and 14. E Hydrogel degradation rate in the three treatment groups calculated by residue weight. n = 5 hydrogels/group. F Dynamic changes of VEGF 165 concentration in HUVEC^vector-laden hydrogels and HUVEC^vegf165+-laden hydrogels during the in vivo treatment process. n = 5 hydrogels/group. G Flow cytometry analysis of single cells lysed from wounds of three rats in each group indicated that the proportion of mitochondrial oxidative stress damage in vascular endothelial cells was 23.2% in the HUVEC ^vegf165+-laden hydrogel group, which was significantly lower than that of the hydrogel group (44.2%) and HUVEC^vector-laden hydrogel group (41.8%). MitoSOX red marked mitochondrial oxidative stress damage; CD 31 marked vascular endothelial cells. The left panel of the figure was created with BioRender.com and has been granted a publication license. H LASCA revealed increased blood flow following the treatment with HUVEC^vegf165+-laden hydrogels. I Quantitative analysis of blood flow based on mean flux. n = 5 rats/group. J HE analysis revealed varied degrees of granulation tissue formation and re-epithelization in the different treatment groups. Arrows: edges of the extended epithelial layer on day 7; &: formation of intact epithelial layer. K Quantitative analysis of granulation tissue thickness in the different treatment groups. n = 5 rats/group. The p values in the figures (D and K) and figure (I) are determined by two-way ANOVA and one-way ANOVA, respectively, followed by Tukey’s multiple comparisons test. Data are presented as mean ± SD. ns not significant. Source data are provided as a Source Data file.