HistoSkin® FFPE skin tissue blocks

In order to help our customers conduct the skin research they need, Genoskin launches HistoSkin® to simplify access to FFPE human skin tissue blocks and sections for studies and analysis. HistoSkin® offers a wide range of fully characterized FFPE tissue blocks and sections and provides new research opportunities involving human skin.

A wide selection of donors

Every year, Genoskin collects a wide range of skin biopsies from consenting donors to create NativeSkin human skin models. As part of our procedures, we stock uncultured control samples of all the human skin tissue we receive. The control samples reflect the characteristics of the collected skin at the time of production and are standardly fixed in 10% buffered formalin, dehydrated and embedded in paraffin.

Over the years, Genoskin has collected over 250 paraffin blocks that are now available for academic and private research. Skin biopsies have mainly been taken from the abdominal area and generally hold the following characteristics:

• Skin Type II & III (Fitzpatrick scale)
• 80% female, 20 % male
• Pathology-free

Fully characterized FFPE human skin tissue blocks

Not only can our customers use HistoSkin® to apply the histological analysis of their choice, they can also, for example select the best donor type to study the impact of their product on aging vs young skin, skin type II vs skin type III skin, male vs female skin, to extract DNA, etc on fully characterized skin sections and blocks. Choice criteria include:

• age
• gender
• skin type
• BMI
• pre-existing skin conditions, allergies and treatments

Standard or custom histology procedures

HistoSkin FFPE skin tissue sections can be used with all types of staining techniques or antibodies, as long as they’re compatible with formalin fixation and paraffin embedding. You can use them to study human skin histology, test biomarkers, conduct immunofluorescence or immunostaining procedures or research expression and distribution of epidermal and dermal markers in human skin.

To further help our customers, Genoskin also offers assistance with study protocols and provides custom histology services. Please don’t hesitate to contact us for more information.