Fabrication and physicochemical characterization of sodium alginate-based hydrogel incorporated with aloe vera and chitosan for wound dressing applications

Hydrogels are considered as promising polymeric biomaterials for wound dressing due to the desirable properties of wound healing. In this work, the use of natural polymeric biomaterials such as aloe vera (AV), chitosan (CH) in sodium alginate (SA)-based hydrogels, a novel hydrogel was produced and characterized that might be applied to healing wounds. Initially, a neat SA specimen was used as a control. Afterward, the specimens were fabricated via the solvent casting method with varying amounts of CH and AV. Morphological changes were observed in SA after the introduction of AV and CH using X-ray diffraction (XRD). The loss of crystalline nature in the SA–Neat and SA–AV samples were observed after the incorporation of CH was revealed by the loss of peaks that were previously observed in the SA–Neat and SA–AV samples. Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy demonstrated strong bonding between SA and the incorporated materials. The samples containing CH exhibited comparatively higher degradation, whereas the AV samples degraded slowly. The hardness of the tested samples increased with the incorporation of AV, whereas an increase in hardness was observed with the incorporation of CH. Thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) and differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) revealed an increase in thermal stability in samples containing AV followed by samples containing CH.