23 Jun New Skin Rejuvenation Technique Uses Pulsed Electric Fields
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Dr. Alexander Golberg
Dr. Alexander Golberg Ph.D.
Center for Engineering in Medicine
Department of Surgery, Massachusetts General Hospital
Harvard Medical School, and Shriners Burns Hospital
Boston, MA, 02114
Porter School of Environmental Studies
Tel Aviv University, Israel
MedicalResearch: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Dr. Golberg: Well, the population grows and becomes older. Degenerative skin diseases affect one third of individuals over the age of sixty. Current therapies use various physical and chemical methods to rejuvenate skin; but since the therapies affect many tissue components including cells and extracellular matrix, they may also induce significant side effects, such as scarring.
We report on a new, non-invasive, non-thermal technique to rejuvenate skin with pulsed electric fields. The fields destroy cells while simultaneously completely preserving the extracellular matrix architecture and releasing multiple growth factors locally that induce new cells and tissue growth. We have identified the specific pulsed electric field parameters in rats that lead to prominent proliferation of the epidermis, formation of microvasculature, and secretion of new collagen at treated areas without scarring. Our results suggest that pulsed electric fields can improve skin function and thus can potentially serve as a novel non-invasive skin therapy for multiple degenerative skin diseases.
MedicalResearch: What should clinicians and patients take away from your report?
Dr. Golberg: We have developed a new method for improving skin metabolism with non-thermal pulsed electric fields. These studies have been done with animals and we are in the process of translating this technology to humans. What is also important is that intervention methods on the cellular and not tissue levels become available for a variety of diseases.
MedicalResearch: What recommendations do you have for future research as a result of this study?
Dr. Golberg: The most important direction for the future is to show the improvement of skin in animals with specific disease models.
The second direction is to show safety and efficiency in humans.
Citation:
Skin Rejuvenation with Non-Invasive Pulsed Electric Fields
Scientific Reports 5, Article number: 10187
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Dr. Alexander Golberg Ph.D. Center for Engineering in Medicine, Department of Surgery, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, and Shriners Burns Hospital, & Boston, MA, 02114 (2015). New Skin Rejuvenation Technique Uses Pulsed Electric Fields
Last Updated on August 12, 2016 by Marie Benz MD FAAD