By protecting against cutaneous inflammation, epidermal pigmentation provided an additional advantage for ancestral humans.

ABSTRACT: Pigmentation evolved in ancestral humans to protect against toxic, ultraviolet B irradiation, but the question remains: "what is being protected?" Because humans with dark pigmentation display a suite of superior epidermal functions in comparison with their more lightly pigmented counterparts, we hypothesized and provided evidence that dark pigmentation evolved in Africa to support cutaneous function. Because our prior clinical studies also showed that a restoration of a competent barrier dampens cutaneous inflammation, we hypothesized that resistance to inflammation could have provided pigmented hominins with yet another, important evolutionary benefit. We addressed this issue here in two closely related strains of hairless mice, endowed with either moderate (Skh2/J) or absent (Skh1) pigm

SUBMITTER: Lin TK 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6824065 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature