Development of Novel Antimicrobial Peptide with Dual Antimicrobial and Wound-Healing Activities as a Topical Burn Wound Therapeutic
Abstract
Burns cause many deaths in soldiers and civilians. To prevent this, treatment right after injury is critical. However, for soldiers in the field, there are few options available, especially since medical equipment and staff are limited. Current treatments, such as silver dressings, antiseptics, and antibiotic ointments/creams, are irritating to the skin and actually delay wound healing. Also, these treatments can hurt patients when large amounts are absorbed into the body, and so these treatments are not intended for large burn wounds. Because of this, there is a great need to develop a safer coverage product to treat large second- and third-degree burn wounds to prevent infection, promote healing, and prevent complications or death. Arrevus is proposing to use a new proprietary product that has already worked against multi-drug resistant superbug infections and sped up healing of burn wounds in many animal studies. This new technology is safe when directly placed on large burn wounds and is also safe even when injected directly into the body of animals. These properties make this technology unique, and our goal is to show that this product is better than current treatments. We will use a pig burn wound model, the "gold standard" in the wound industry that has been used in many DoD projects. Since pig skin is very similar to human skin, showing that our product works in this model is an important milestone and interim outcome. We will also look at the safety of our product by using "gold standard" safety studies to see if there is any skin toxicity. This project will take 2 years, and we will use the information from these studies to follow FDA guidelines and create a commercial product. We aim to advance this to human clinical trials within 3 years (2025). The overall goal of this research is to provide all patients (military and non-military) who have burn wounds with a safe and effective treatment to prevent infections and speed the healing of their wounds. This product is stable and can be used directly on the skin in many forms, as a topical solution, cream/ointment, and/or wound dressing. This makes it easy to use without requiring any special equipment or training. Everyone, including patients, non-medical, and/or medical first responders, can use it at the time of injury and continue this treatment. Importantly, previous studies show that this product can work with just-once daily use. Also, we will develop this product in stable packaging so that it can be included in a first aid kit. Since this product is safe when absorbed into the body, this treatment can be used on large and severe burn wounds without side effects. Using this product will offer many benefits. The short-term benefit of this product for patients is that it will prevent and treat infections without toxic side effects. It will also speed up wound healing. This will lead to shorter recovery times and decrease the risk of death and complications. Patients can return to active duty or civilian life sooner. Even though the information so far looks promising, we do not know what will happen in humans. There is a risk of potential side effects or that it may not work as expected. Because of this, we have designed experiments that will compare this product to others that are already used. We will advance this program in a step-wise manner and follow all of the government and industry guidelines to determine how safe and useful this will be for patients. We will also test this in humans following all the government requirements to make sure we minimize risks to study volunteers.
Document Details
- Document Type
- DoD Grant Award
- Publication Date
- Mar 10, 2021
- Source ID
- W81XWH2010395
Entities
People
- Daina Zeng
Organizations
- United States Army