Experts have long believed that dermatitis causes the itching associated with eczema, but Harvard researchers have discovered that the process that triggers the urge to scratch is separate from the cause of eczema itself.
Eczema is known as a group of inflammatory skin diseases that cause itching, dry skin, rashes, scaly patches, and inflammation.
The condition can worsen to the point where it becomes debilitating, with skin inflammation all over the body.
Researchers identified Staphylococcus aureus, a common type of skin bacteria, as the agent responsible for the itching.
In the study, the researchers exposed mice to Staphylococcus aureus, which caused them to suffer from severe itching that worsened over several days and led to skin damage.
The research team then modified different versions of the microbe Staphylococcus aureus to find the enzymes responsible for the itch. They discovered that the V8 protease was responsible.
The researchers also found that this enzyme interacts directly with nerve cells in the skin, which send a signal to the brain, leading to the desire to scratch.
“We found that itching can be caused directly by a bacterial pathogen - Staphylococcus aureus - which is a very common microbe found in about 30% of people, especially in the nose,” said Isaac Chiu, assistant professor of immunology at Harvard Medical School.
The study was published in the journal Cell.
Unveiling a jacket that “maps heart activity” You could save thousands of lives!
A team of scientists has created a vest containing 256 separate electrodes, which can be worn across the chest and back to pick up various electrical signals from the heart.
The vest has the ability to produce a more detailed picture of heart activity in just five minutes, which could save lives by helping to detect people with dangerously fast heartbeats, as well as those who need a pacemaker.
After Luton captain Tom Lockyer has cardiac arrest and collapses on the pitch, could this heart vest that maps electrical activity help save thousands of lives?
In the future, the vest could be used to monitor the risk of sudden cardiac arrest in healthy young people.
The researchers showed that this technology can detect electrical heart rhythm disturbances in healthy people, but it has not yet been used to predict this.
The vest, which was funded by the British Heart Foundation and is already being used for research in some London hospitals, has been used successfully on 800 patients, but has not yet been tested on all different types of heart disease.
Currently, it is being used to map the hearts of people with genetic conditions such as hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, and to show the difference in heart rhythm between young people and older people.
Researchers believe it could also help people with the most common form of irregular heartbeat, called atrial fibrillation, which may put them at risk of stroke.
Dr Gaby Kaptur, from University College London and the Royal Free Hospital in London, who invented the vest, said: “This could be a quick and affordable vest, helping to save thousands of lives by identifying people at risk of life-threatening heart attacks.”
Until now, detailed mapping of the heart's electrical activity has been rare, requiring either the insertion of a catheter into the heart, or expensive disposable devices combined with CT scanners, thus producing radiation.