The secret to youthful appearance and repairing scars may lie in a microscopic skin structure humans share with pigs and grizzly bears — but, surprisingly, not monkeys.
While it had been thought these ridge and valley-like skin microstructures — called rete ridges — form during fetal growth, researchers at Washington State University’s College of Veterinary Medicine found they actually develop shortly after birth and identified a key molecular signal that drives their development.
The findings, published in the journal Nature, could lead to new therapies designed to reverse or slow skin aging and improve wound and scar repair.
“These structures degrade as we age; now we know how they form and have a blueprint to guide future work on restoring them,” said Ryan Driskell, an associate professor in the College of Veterinary Medicine’s School of Molecular Biosciences and senior author on the paper. “Most scientists assumed these skin ridges formed during early embryonic development, which explains why no one really understood their origin.”
Rete ridges act like biological “Velcro,” Driskell said, anchoring the outer layer of skin, or epidermis, to the dermal layer beneath while helping to maintain elasticity and strength. As these ridges flatten with age, skin becomes thinner and more prone to sagging and damage.
Despite their importance, research has been stalled for decades by a major hurdle: the wrong animal models.
Click here to see more...