Culture of Psoriatic and Uninvolved Human Skin in Diffusion Chambers in Mice

Pieces of psoriatic and uninvolved skin were cultured for as long as 8 days in vivo in diffusion chambers implanted intraperitoneally in adult mice. On the 2nd day, the greatest part of the psoriatic epidermis degenerated and separated from the remaining regenerating basal cells, while the uninvolved skin either survived intact or only the uppermost cell layers degenerated. In autoradiograms made from the cultures, labeling with 3H-TdR began on the 2nd day in the epidermal cells either at the cut edges or through the whole explant of both psoriatic and uninvolved skin: maximal labeling indices were reached in 2- to 5-day-old cultures. The labeling indices in both the psoriatic and uninvolved epidermis were at about the same level (max ∼ 14%). Thus, in this study there was no obvious difference in the proliferation of epidermal cells derived from the psoriatic and uninvolved skin. These results are similar to the findings obtained with cultured psoriatic and normal skin in vitro.