Skin is an organ, and it is indeed the largest organ in the body. Skin serves an essential set of functions in the body. It regulates body temperature, maintains water and electrolyte balance, and senses painful and pleasant stimuli. In addition, the skin keeps essential chemicals and nutrients in a while, providing a block against dangerous substances trying to access the body. It also ensures a shield from the harmful effects of ultraviolet radiation emitted by the sun.
Skin as a Protective Barrier
The skin is the body’s largest organ, measuring about one-eighth of an inch thick and comprising roughly 10% of our total body weight. The skin consists of two layers: a protective outer layer, just 1/250th of an inch thick, known as the epidermis, and a slightly thicker inner layer, called the dermis.
Products improving barrier function
When healthy, our skin provides several essential services to us. The skin serves as a shield, preventing excessive moisture loss or gain, keeping disease-causing pathogens and organisms out, and protecting us from chemical, physical, and biological hazards. It also protects our underlying network of tissues, bones, and organs from injury.
Our skin plays an essential role in maintaining a normal core body temperature. When the body overheats, fewer nerve impulses are sent to the blood vessels in the skin.
While collagen is a critical factor in maintaining healthy, beautiful skin, there is another protein in our skin that is equally important for the health and appearance of our skin: elastin. Elastin is a protein found in the skin and connective tissue throughout our bodies.
The main skin matrix fillers are glycans (a type of glucose-based polymers that include glycosaminoglycans and proteoglycans). In so far as skin rejuvenation goes the key glycan is hyaluronic acid (otherwise known as hyaluronan, hyaluronate, or HA).