Abstract
Background
The skin constitutes the largest sensorial organ. Its nervous system consists of different
types of afferent nerve fibers which spread out immediately beneath the skin surface
to sense temperature, touch and pain.
Objective
Our aim was to investigate the dimension and topographic relationship of the different
nerve fibers of the subepidermal nerve plexus in human hairy skin and to analyze numbers
and marker expression of terminal Schwann cells.
Methods
Nerve fibers and Schwann cells were investigated on dermal sheet preparations and
thick sections of skin from various body regions of 10 individuals.
Results
The dimension of subepidermal nerve fibers varied between different body sites with
highest values in chest skin (100 ± 18 mm/mm2) and lowest in posterior forearm skin (53 ± 10 mm/mm2). The majority of fibers (85.79%) were unmyelinated, thus representing C-fibers,
of which 7.84% were peptidergic. Neurofilament-positive fibers (A-fibers) accounted
for 14.21% and fibers positive for both neurofilament and myelin (Aβ-fibers) for only
0.18%. The number of Schwann cells varied in accordance with nerve fiber length from
453 ± 108 on chest skin to 184 ± 58/mm2 in skin of the posterior forearm. Terminal Schwann cells showed a marker profile
comparable to Schwann cells in peripheral nerves with the notable exception of expression
of NGFr, NCAM, L1CAM and CD146 on myelinating Schwann cells in the dermis but not
in peripheral nerves.
Conclusion
Our data show that terminal Schwann cells constitute a substantial cell population
within the papillary dermis and that both nerve fiber length and Schwann cell numbers
vary considerably between different body sites.
Keywords
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Article info
Publication history
Published online: February 03, 2012
Accepted:
October 20,
2011
Received in revised form:
October 19,
2011
Received:
August 1,
2011
Identification
Copyright
© 2011 Japanese Society for Investigative Dermatology. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
