Prior ultraviolet (UV) irradiation of the site of application of hapten on murine skin reduces contact sensitization, impairs the ability of dendritic cells in the draining lymph nodes (DLN) to present antigen, and leads to development of hapten-specific suppressor T lymphocytes. We tested the hypothesis that UV-induced DNA damage plays a role in the impaired antigen-presenting activity of DLN ...

Ultraviolet (UV) radiation is the most common cause of physical injury to the skin due to environmental damage, and UV exposure substantially increases the risk of actinic damage to the skin. The inflammatory changes induced by acute UV exposure include erythema (sunburn) of the skin, while chronic exposure to solar UV radiation causes photo-aging, immunosuppression, and ultimately, carcinogene...

Smad4 loss occurs frequently in human skin squamous cell carcinoma (SCC), but it is unknown whether this loss increases UV-induced carcinogenesis, a major etiological factor in skin cancer. In the present study, mice with keratinocyte-specific Smad4 deletion (K14.Smad4(-/-)) and wild-type (WT) littermates were chronically UV-irradiated. Compared with WT, K14.Smad4(-/-) mice exhibited increased ...

BACKGROUND Exposure to high doses of ionizing radiation (IR) can lead to localized radiation injury of the skin and exposed cells suffer dsDNA breaks that may elicit cell death or stochastic changes. Little is known about the DNA damage response after high-dose exposure of the skin. Here, we investigate the cellular and DNA damage response in acutely irradiated minipig skin. METHODS AND FINDI...

Cancer prevention is a cost-effective alternative to treatment. In mice, the mTOR inhibitor rapamycin prevents distinct spontaneous, noninflammatory cancers, making it a candidate broad-spectrum cancer prevention agent. We now show that oral microencapsulated rapamycin (eRapa) prevents skin cancer in dimethylbenz(a)anthracene (DMBA)/12-O-tetradecanoylphorbol-13-acetate (TPA) carcinogen-induced,...