European Journal of Biomedical and Pharmaceutical Sciences

AN OVERVIEW ON THE SKIN PERMEATION

Bhawana Sethi, Mohit Soni and Anil Kumar Sahdev*

ABSTRACT

Skin as an organ of protection covers the body and accomplishes multiple defensive functions. The intact skin represents a barrier to the ingress of xenobiotics and the egress of water, proteins, and plasma components from the organism. Due to its complex structure, the epidermal barrier with its major component, stratum corneum, is the rate-limiting unit for the penetration of exogenous substances through the skin. Over the past few decades a considerable work was done on delivery of drugs through the skin or to breach the skin barrier. This review gives about the information on the permeation of the molecules through the skin and models to predict the skin permeability.

Keywords: Epidermal barrier, stratum corneum, permeation.