Reconstructed skin for in vitro cutaneous pharmacotoxicology: Example of metabolic studies

This article reviews one of the applications of reconstructed skin or epidermis in pharmacotoxicology: their use in the in vitro evaluation of skin metabolism. The various skin models available nowadays are described. They include reconstructed human epidermis and reconstructed skin (with a epidermis and a viable dermis element). The results obtained with these models concerning basal and inducible monooxygenase activities and other metabolic activities on topically applied compounds are developed. Finally, the possible applications of these models in dermatology are considered, particularly the effect of imidazole derivatives on cytochrome P-450-dependent activities of human keratinocytes.