Connective Tissue. II. Distant Dermal Collagen Response to Local Inflammation. ∗

Abstract

Summary and Conclusions

Skin distant from local croton oil induced inflammation demonstrates no significant change in total hexosamine or nitrogen, despite a marked decrease in 0.5 M saline soluble, insoluble and total collagen. Since less than 5% of total soluble nitrogen is not protein, this constancy of dermal nitrogen means that non-collagenous dermal proteins or glycoporteins are being synthesized. Therefore insoluble collagen is specifically decreased in response to local inflammation. It is suggested that this distant dermal collagen response to local inflammation results from enzymatic collagenolysis which stimulates the attempted synthesis of replacement collagen. A steady state with respect to collagen anabolism and catabolism could then be established in which, by reason of the relative rates of synthesis and degradation, the skin would contain subnormal amounts of 0.5M saline soluble and insoluble collagen and supernormal