How I created scientific journal introduction: Scaffold Design for Wound Dressing by PVA-collagen Nanofibers Loaded Piper betle Nano-extract

Last week (6/3/2024), I attended the NT9064 course on journal introduction, and I’m excited to share my insights here.

First, let’s find out what a journal introduction is? The journal introduction offers background information essential for understanding the rationale behind the described experimental, computational, or theoretical approach. It outlines previous research on the topic that has generated unanswered questions addressed by various approaches. An introduction summarize all of things you’ve learned from your research. A good introduction should be fairly heavy with citations.

In crafting a journal introduction, it’s helpful to define any specialized terms to make it easier for a wider range of readers to understand. For an engaging introduction, it’s advisable to be clear and concise, use a logical structure, and avoid overly complicated sentences. Additionally, be passionate about the research and keep your message focused on the central point of your argument. Don’t forget to point out the knowledge gap. Finally, wrap up the introduction by stating the goals and novelty of the conducted research. A well-written introduction will broaden readers with insights, facilitating citation.

Structure of introduction section

Funnel construct

In general, there are 4 steps to writing an introduction:

1. Provide background information and set the context,
2. Introduce the spesific topic of your research and explain why answer it is important,
3. Mention past attempts to solve the research problem or to answer the research question, and
4. Conclude the introduction by mentioning the specific objectives of your research.

Here is an example of the introduction I’ve created.

— Scaffold Design for Wound Dressing by PVA-collagen Nanofibers Loaded Piper betle Nano-extract

Skin is the largest organ in the body. As outer barrier of the body, skin play various roles in thermoregulation, endocrine, metabolic, immunological, and neurosensory functions of the skin. Wounds that occur on the skin can trigger skin damage and can causes disruption of its functional integrity (Yang et al., 2020). In the skin, there are two classes of wounds — acute and chronic. Acute wounds are injuries to the skin which are healed by the normal process of wound repair. Wounds that have not progressed through the normal repair process and remain unhealed for an extended period are referred to as chronic wounds. The latter type of wound is a major clinical challenge in the healthcare system because chronic wounds treatments are more complicated as they reach deeper into the skin. The delayed and incomplete healing process of chronic wounds exposes patients to a high risk of infection (Firoozbahr et al., 2023; Kulkarni et al., 2022). Thus, for severe and chronic wounds, more advanced treatments and wound dressings should be applied to assist with accelerating wound healing and preventing infection.

Modern wound dressings are designed to minimize tissue loss and provide a barrier against bacterial penetration. In assisting wound care and healing processes, appropriate wound dressings should be applied based on the wound type, location, depth, amount of exudate, wound adhesion, and permeability (Firoozbahr et al., 2023). One form of modern wound dressing, called biomaterial scaffolds, obtained from natural tissues or artificial sources are biocompatible, biodegradable, nontoxic, and possess physicochemical properties that enable them to support cell attachment, proliferation and/or differentiation (Akombaetwa et al., 2022). In this nano era, wound dressings composed of nanomaterials are drawing increasing attention to meet the large demands from the commercial markets and overcome the drawbacks of traditional wound dressings (Yang et al., 2020).

Nanofibers membranes as scaffolding biomaterial can be synthesized from mixed matrix of natural and synthethic polymers (Akombaetwa et al., 2022). Biopolymers such as collagen well known as necessary for structural support in connective tissue and have been widely aplicated scaffolds tissue engineering. In human skin, the most abundant constituent collagen is type 1 collagen and in fact it is also often found in marine invertebrate tissue (Senadheera et al., 2020). Collagen from marine sources was claimed by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to be generally recognized as safe (GRAS) and has no risk to transmitting disease. Even though collagen has good accessibility, flexibility, and biocompatibility (Avila Rodríguez et al., 2018), manufacturing nanofibers from collagen has limitations owing to mechanical properties has many deficiencies compared to synthetic polymers, making it difficult to be processed using electrospinning (Reddy et al., 2021). Non-toxic and non-carcinogenic synthetic resin such as polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) is suitable to combined with collagen in nanofibers as support material which has high tensile strength and flexibility (Zou et al., 2020).

Besides that, there is challenges of wound dressings linked to wound infection are significant. The healing of an infected wound needs the application of antibiotics to control infection(Kaiser et al., 2021). But, inappropriate use of antibiotics in human medicine therapy is the main cause of the development of bacterial resistance to antibiotics. Plantbased active compounds seem to be a good alternative. In Indonesia, Piper betle leaf is one of the common plant used for traditional medicine to cure skin infections. Previous research has shown that betel leaf contains alkaloids, flavonoids, tannins, saponins, phenolics, and terpenoid compounds that inhibit bacterial growth (Sakinah et al, 2020). Bioactive ingredients of plant micro-extract has low bioavailability, limit their clinical uses. Utilizing nanotechnology structure, natural extracts were found to reduce the treatment dose, increase the compounds solubility, and increase absorption (Fibriani et al., 2023). Betel leaf nano-extract have better antibacterial and anti-inflammatory efficacy by increasing their ability to penetrate cell walls (Florenly et al., 2022).

In line with modern wound dressing, in this study, we design a scaffold wound dressing by nanofibers PVA-collagen loaded Piper betle nano-extract. Collagen product was extraction and purification from Holothuria scabra which was determined micro and nano particle sizes. The aim of this research is to obtain substance of primary wound dressing materials that effectively stimulates and promotes tissue formation that prevent growth of bacteria from Indonesian natural sources.