Skin

A new review has highlighted how skin tone can affect the safety and effectiveness of some medications and why the current way we run clinical drug trials needs to change to include more historically underrepresented populations.

Surgical stitches are good for helping wounds heal, but they can pop open with too much movement. Scientists have now turned that weakness into a strength, developing stitches that generate an electric charge when stretched and heal wounds faster.

While topically-applied medications do help alleviate various skin conditions, they'd be even more effective if they could better penetrate the skin's surface. Newly developed nanoceramic "stars" may one day help, by poking tiny holes in the skin.

Sensors such as EEG electrodes can help save a person's life, but the adhesive patches used to attach them may also harm that person's skin. An experimental new medical patch addresses that issue by utilizing octopus-inspired suckers.

A pigment molecule in cephalopod skin has had its antioxidant and sun-protection properties harnessed, inspiring the first ultra-protective, skin-restorative and environmentally safe sunscreen of its kind. And it could revolutionize the skincare world.

In a breakthrough that isn't at all creepy, scientists have devised a method of anchoring living human skin to robots' faces. The technology could actually have some valuable applications, beyond making Westworld-like scenarios a reality.

Scientists have discovered the oldest known skin fossils, dating back long before the dinosaurs. The samples, found in a cave in Oklahoma, USA, show that reptile scales haven’t changed much in the last 286 million years.

In a world first, researchers have printed multi-layered, living skin directly onto significant injuries in rats for scar-free skin repair. It's not sci-fi – they're genuinely 3D-printing skin (and possibly hair) right into damaged areas.

A gel of tiny keratin spheres has been found to promote hair follicle growth. Given that our bodies naturally produce keratin, the research highlights the potential application of using keratin microspheres as a safe and effective hair-growth treatment.

Acne is an annoying part of pretty much everyone’s lives, and in some cases can get serious. Now, scientists have demonstrated an intriguing new way to fight it, by engineering bacteria that live on the skin to produce proteins found in acne drugs.

Scientists have had a career-making moment, capturing on film a dolphin with such a rare skin condition that only five other recorded examples exist. The dramatic black-and-white look, or piebaldism, has never been seen on a dolphin in Australian waters.

After confounding scientists for more than 80 years, researchers have finally discovered how the flesh-eating Buruli ulcer is transmitted: mosquitoes. The discovery means practical measures can now be taken to restrict the spread of the disease.