Nanotech-enabled moisturiser ‘can aid diabetic skin wound healing’

A new ointment that incorporates nanotechnology has been developed as a means of treating diabetic skin wounds more rapidly than is currently possible.

The Northwestern University project utilises spherical nucleic acids (SNAs), a nanoscale globular form of RNA, combined with a common commercial moisturiser to topically knock out a gene known to interfere with wound healing.

When tested using diabetic mice, the ointment was shown to improve healing in the mice treated with SNAs after only four days. The wounds in the treated animals were healed within 12 days, whereas the control group's wounds took 18 days to heal.

It is thought the ointment could be used to prevent diabetic ulcers completely and to reduce the abnormal sensations frequently felt in the feet of people with diabetes.

Chad Mirkin, a chemist at Northwestern University who invented SNAs in 1996, said: "This work illustrates the scope and potential impact of the SNA platform for treating conditions of the skin with a known genetic basis."

In 2010, there were approximately 3.1 million people aged 16 or over with diabetes in the UK – a figure that is expected to rise to 4.6 million by 2030.