Skin is the largest organ of our body, and every individual’s skin is fundamentally different. Many factors, like environment, lifestyle, and DNA, affect our skin physiologically. So, we can strike the notion that what worked for someone would be the same for you. We need skincare products that are customized on an individual level.

With this challenge in heart, we enter the world of Microbiomes. Here, we study the bacteria, viruses, and fungi that live on our skin and how they affect our skin’s fundamental texture, evenness, etc., following multiple procedures called Microbiome Sequencing.

We are all familiar with the microorganisms living in our gut and the importance of these microorganisms in our digestive system’s health, affecting our overall metabolic rate and immunity. Like the gut, our skin is home to diverse microorganisms like staphylococcus aureus, Staphylococcus epidermidis, etc. But there is a general perception that we need to remove or cleanse all kinds of microbes from our skin since they are harmful to our skin and cause multiple skin issues. But it’s time to change the narrative as we enter the microbiome world. Today, there is multiple ongoing global research to develop new formulations based on each person’s microbiome. It is believed that the key to enhancing your skin’s appearance and quality is addressing the microorganisms living on your skin surface rather than treating the symptoms.

Do you know that the skin microbiome has many positive effects on your skin? Your skin is rich in trillions of microorganisms that act as a protective barrier against external stimuli like environmental aggression, long exposure to UV rays, and pollution. The diverse microorganisms’ ecosystem on your skin, consisting of bacteria, fungi, and viruses, plays an important role in overall skin health while constantly interacting with our skin. It is now when we need to take care of our skin microbiome to protect ourselves from various skin diseases like acne, eczema, micro-inflammation, etc.

But our skin microbiome is fragile. The balanced ratio between pathogens and good microorganisms gets disturbed when the skin barrier gets affected or broken. This can cause several skin diseases. And this balance is delicate and easily gets affected under the circumstances like increased acidity levels of your skin, increased oiliness, etc.

A need for Individualized Skincare routines!

Each of us has a specific skin microbiota signature. Now, the signature is influenced by many factors like environmental factors and lifestyle. For instance, where we live, what we eat, what we drink, how much we travel, etc. The signature keeps changing, but our DNA and RNA determine the fundamental microbiota signature. It is important to understand every individual’s skin flora to address each skin issue like eczema, acne, etc., better. It has been proven that if one can control the composition of the diverse ecosystem living on the skin, we can treat some severe skin issues. Also, do you know there are direct links between microorganisms and skin regarding aging like wrinkles, fine lines, etc.?

We are now about to witness another revolution in the pharmaceutical industry that will specifically use skin’s microbiome to offer your skin products that not only suit your skin but delivers promising results.

How do we know about your Skin Microbiome?

Before we discuss how to treat our skin microbiome, we first need to ask how to know which microbes in what concentration are living on our skin.

Earlier procedures to study skin microbiomes were culture-based. In this method, we study microbe, which thrives in artificial growth conditions. But it failed to estimate the true nature of total microbe diversity on our skin. Some of the microbes cultivate more in an artificial environment than it would on real human skin.

That’s the reason why we now use another method called Microbiome Sequencing. This technique solves the bias that culture-based methods impose on the results. For instance, we use the gene 16S Ribosomal RNA to study bacteria. But for fungi, we use ITS of the eukaryotic ribosomal gene.

With the evolution of modern technology in the dermaceutical industry and genetic engineering, we now have more advanced methods for microbiome sequencing. Earlier, we used Sanger sequencing, but now, we prefer NGS (Next Generation Sequencing) Sequencing to have more read depths in short lengths. These sequencing methods have proven to be more efficient and accurate.  There are two options: firstly Amplicon which is specific to a type of microbes, example 16S for bacteria, ITS for fungus and so on. Secondly, Shotgun metagenomics which will cover all the microbes together.

Learn the Skin Microbiome

After we finish Microbiome Sequencing, we clearly understand the skin microbiomes' original composition. It also helps us learn which kinds of microbes need to be saved and which microbes are harming our skin. Research has shown that the composition depends on the physiological attributes of the human body. Each part of our skin has a different environment like dryness, sebaceous gland’s oil production, moisture, etc. Sebaceous pores have more chances to house lipophilic Propionibacterium, whereas moist skin areas have Staphylococcus and Corynebacterium species.

So, the next challenge is identifying which molecules act positively on the skin and its microbiome. We now know that we have good microbes and pathogens living together. We need some formulations that don’t hurt or strip off all the good microbes while cleansing the pathogens. Usually, most skin products hurt our skin microbiome. That’s why people face many skin issues like inflammation, eczema, acne, etc., even after product application.

Four ways to treat skin microbiome

There are four ways to treat your skin microbiome. All four ways aim at the microbe flora on our skin.

1. Removes/Cleanse bad bacteria
2. Prebiotic: Feed the good bacteria
3. Probiotic: Add good bacteria
4. Post Biotic: Add by-products of Bacteria.

Soon, we will have a plethora of cosmetic and skincare products based on treating skin microbiomes for hygiene routines. From active cosmetics to anti-dandruff shampoos, we can now combat skin and hair issues by addressing the skin microbiomes of each individual while rebalancing the diverse ecosystem. For sensitive skin, research is going on to know how to extract postbiotics from protective microorganisms and apply that in formulations for creams, gels, and shampoos.

The skin microbiome is slowly becoming a rage in anti-aging products. Some skin care products have successfully launched formulations enriched with 6+ probiotic and prebiotic characteristics that help to rebalance and boost the good microbes in the ecosystem. Also, it has proven to help skin recover and heal faster while making one visibly younger.

For knowing more about our microbiome sequencing service, please share you enquiry https://www.eurofins.in/genomics/enquire-now/ . Our experts will help you design your project.

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