The role of defensins in hidradenitis suppurativa

Understanding the causes of a chronic skin disease, to design better treatments Hidradenitis Suppurativa (HS) is a devastating skin disease producing painful abscesses in the armpits and groin. These wounds often heal badly, resulting in considerable scarring. Most people haven’t heard of it, and even many GPs know little about it, despite more than 1% of the population suffering with it. It can take many years to get a diagnosis, and while some treatments are available, the only option for those severely affected is major surgery. The exact causes of the disease are unknown, although many factors can affect it. Smoking and obesity can make symptoms worse, but in some cases it runs in families, and some genes affect how likely a person is to become ill. One of these genes controls production of a group of proteins called β-defensins. People who make a lot of these proteins are more likely to have the disease.
β-defensins are small proteins that help to protect the body from infection in many different ways. When the body detects an infection, it stimulates the skin cells to produce these proteins, releasing them into the body, where they kill microbes and switch on immune cells to help clear the infection. Another important role that the proteins play is to help the skin to heal wounds. However, too much β-defensin can also hinder the body’s ability to repair itself. Scientists know that skin from HS patients does not heal very well. It could be that high levels of β-defensins are damaging to the skin’s wound-healing abilities.
This project will study how β-defensins affect wound-healing in the skin, and how it might cause disease in people with HS. Layers of skin cells will be grown in a dish, just like a layer of skin, and a wound will be made in it by scratching. When different amounts of β-defensin are added to the dish, I will look at how quickly the scratch heals, to find out if too much protein weakens this ability. This will give me information about how β-defensins might be causing illness in HS patients. By stopping some of the proteins from binding to the cells, I also hope to find a way to improve wound-healing in skin from HS patients. This could allow the design of better treatments for patients who are currently suffering with this crippling disease.