PROPERTIES OF HUMAN SKIN REVEALED BY FLUORESCENCE MICROSCOPY

Abstract

The idea of examining the skin and its appendages and pathogenic fungi under ultraviolet rays and for their fluorescent properties is well known. Skin and epidermal appendages impart a characteristic fluorescence, as do fungous infections of the scalp, although cultures of the different fungi vary in their fluorescent properties. The microscopic examination of the skin under ultraviolet rays (fluorescence microscopy) has only rarely been employed.¹ Our interest in examining the skin under the fluorescence microscope was to find new diagnostic possibilities in the histologic study of the skin. Before we describe some of the new observations, it is appropriate to describe briefly the picture of the normal skin as shown by fluorescence microscopy. Not only the spontaneous fluorescence but also some staining reactions with fluorescent dyes were studied (fluorochromy).² Our interest in these studies was also stimulated by the demonstration of vitamin A by fluorescence microscopy.³ The