Inflammatory linear verrucous epidermal nevus is a variant of verrucous epidermal nevus, characterized by recurrent inflammatory phenomena. Despite well-established clinical manifestations, the differential diagnosis between inflammatory linear verrucous epidermal nevus and linear psoriasis remains difficult. Clinical history, physical examination and histopathology analysis may not be sufficie...

In the skin, aging is associated with overall epidermal thinning, decreased barrier function, and gradual deterioration of the epidermal immune response. However, the presence and role of cytokines, chemokines, and biologic analytes (CCBAs) in immunosenescence are not known. Here we identified age-related changes in skin properties and CCBAs from stratum corneum of healthy human subjects, provi...

During the evolution of primates from nonprimates, the gene for involucrin was greatly altered by changes in the short tandem repeats that are present in some form in the gene of each of 17 species examined. The evolution of involucrin was not the result of a single continuum of more or less random changes, and it was not confined to the process of nucleotide substitution, the most commonly stu...

Terminally differentiated mammalian epidermal cells are lined with a 15 nm thick layer of proteins cross-linked by isodipeptide and disulfide bonds, called the cornified cell envelope (CE). A number of proteins, including involucrin, loricrin, cystatin A, filaggrin, a cysteine-rich protein (CRP) and the 'small proline-rich' proteins (SPRRs) have been reported to be components of this complex, b...

Tumour necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-alpha) has been implicated in the pathogenesis of psoriasis. Its effect on keratinocytes from healthy and psoriatic skin was investigated. The keratinocytes were co-cultured with healthy and psoriatic fibroblasts in skin equivalents and grown in a serum-free medium for 15 days. TNF-alpha was added, or not, on day 12. The expression of differentiation and prolif...

Involucrin is synthesized in abundance during terminal differentiation of keratinocytes. Involucrin is a substrate for transglutaminase and one of the precursors of the cross-linked envelopes present in the corneocytes of the epidermis and other stratified squamous epithelia. These envelopes make an important contribution to the physical resistance of the epidermis. We have generated mice lacki...

Different stratified squamous epithelia, whether they bear a stratum corneum or not, are shown by immunofluorescence to possess the precursor protein of the cross-linked envelope that is characteristic of epidermal s. corneum. This protein, involucrin, is not present in the deepest epithelial cells but appears in the course of their outward migration. The boundary at which involucrin first appe...

Investigations into the possibility that X (an antigen consistently present in aspirated odontogenic keratocysts, but not in most fluids from other cyst types), represented a keratinocyte component failed to identify the antigen as a keratin, involucrin, or one of the blood group substances. Antigen X was detected in human mixed and parotid saliva and in colostrum, as well as in a commercially ...

To test the hypothesis that factor VIII expressed in the epidermis can correct hemophilia A, we generated transgenic mice in a factor VIII-deficient background that express human factor VIII under control of the involucrin promoter. Mice from 5 transgenic lines had both phenotypic correction and plasma factor VIII activity. In addition to the skin, however, some factor VIII expression was detec...

PURPOSE Understanding the mechanisms that regulate gene expression in the human cornea is an important goal. In the present study, the involucrin gene was used as a model to study this regulation. Human involucrin (hINV) is a structural protein that is selectively expressed in surface epithelia, including corneal epithelial cells. METHODS Regulation of involucrin gene expression was monitored...