Non-healing chronic wounds are common and serious complications of diabetes. The result is more than 70,000 lower limb amputations in the U.S. each year. Leg and foot infections are often very difficult to treat with antibiotics in part because diabetics often have reduced blood flow in their legs. But this is not a complete explanation, and medicine has not fully understood why diabetic wounds are so resistant to healing.

New research from Notre Dame’s Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry has identified two enzymes in the wounds of diabetic mice that seem to play a negative role in the body’s response to wound healing. The researchers identified inhibitors to the enzymes, which accelerated wound healing in the mice. They found that a combination of two of the inhibitors enhanced healing. The researchers are currently recruiting diabetic patients to test the presence of the inhibitors in their wounds in order to determine whether this approach has promise in healing of human diabetic wounds. The study appears in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.