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Research into the bacterial and fungal ecology of normal skin has lain relatively fallow for decades. Now, new techniques in molecular biology are driving an explosion of such research. The skin is a battleground on which the animate environment faces off against the innate and acquired immune systems, including natural antimicrobial peptides. Qualitative and quantitative skin sampling is made possible by recognition of microbial species–specific signatures in portions of 16S ribosomal RNA.
Investigators at the National Institutes of Health collected samples of resident microorganisms at three levels of skin from the crease of the antecubital fossae in five healthy volunteers: by swabbing with a …