Abstract

Smart wound dressings are made of smart biomaterials; these advanced systems enable controlled drug delivery in chronic wound applications and can also adjust to physiological changes. To understand the biological process of wound healing, well-defined mathematical models are necessary, especially to capture the interaction between diffusion and biochemical responses within the chronic wound environment. Despite advances in biomaterial production, comprehensive mathematical modelling of the mechanisms governing therapy efficacy has received little attention. This study develops a mathematical framework to investigate controlled drug-release kinetics and molecular transport in smart wound dressings. We used the coupled reaction-diffusion system to characterise transport events such as therapeutic diffusion, biomaterial degradation, and biological processes induced by oxidative stress radicals. Sensitivity analysis identified critical factors affecting treatment availability, and transport-reaction features were studied using equilibrium and dimensional analysis. The model showed that while degradation and ROS-sensitive processes drove long-term concentration dynamics, diffusion-related factors most influenced therapeutic transport. Dimensionless analysis distinguished diffusion-dominated and reaction-dominated transport regimes, and equilibrium analysis revealed conditions linked to long-term therapeutic availability. The findings suggest that biomathematical modelling may forecast therapeutic transport in evolving wound-healing settings over time and help develop effective wound-healing systems.