The global prevalence of diabetes and diabetic foot ulcers (DFUs) is increasing, with a high-risk of morbidity, amputation, and mortality. Unfortunately, many DFUs progress to being chronic wounds and there is no consensus as to how to treat these wounds with many treatments having conditional/low levels of evidence. Moreover, wound care therapies take significant time and resource to develop. One wound care based treatment called ‘Tissue Repair Technologies – Molecule X’ or TRTx has shown promise. First reported in 2012 by University of Canterbury Professor Rudi Marquez-Mazlin. Discovered was a novel low molecular weight compound with apparent strong wound healing properties with the possibility of use in DFUs. In 2016, they identified the specific compound that was responsible for the wound healing effects termed the ‘migration-stimulating factor’. The challenge was that this protein was unstable degrading quickly. The development team went onto design a mimic of this protein that had greater stability. Laboratory trials proved successful, with diabetic mice healing as fast as healthy mice; however murine tissue is not reflective of human healing. A subsequent cutting-edge equine model, whose skin has similar properties to that of humans with severe diabetes, has shown promise. By 2021, TRTx was released as a wound healing support gel for use in equine care. In humans, there has been some limited use off-licence in Plastic Surgery with good results. This year, the development team is applying for ethics to conduct a pilot study to investigate whether TRTx wound support gel increases the efficiency of split thickness skin graft donor site healing compared to standard best practice based on conventional wound dressings. This talk will discuss this promising area of research for wound care therapies for DFUs, and highlight the iterative process and challenges to take wound care therapies to clinical practice.