Spray-On Skin Kit

Avita Medical has created a new spray-on skin kit known as the ReCell Kit that does exactly what it sounds like - generates new skin for you after a simple spraying mechanism. It can be used to treat burns, wounds, and even correct blemishes for cosmetic purposes, such as altering abnormally pigmented skin or improving the appearance of scars.

Although this kit does seem to work wonders, its basis lies strictly in the scientific realm. In short, the keratinocytes and melanocytes of the patient are harvested and then suspended in a solution in which they can multiply. It is this solution that is sprayed onto the patient and results in the growth of new skin. Because the harvested cells come directly from the patient, any risks of the immune system rejecting the treatment are eliminated.

The reason these two types of cells are used in the solution is because they are the building blocks of skin. Keratinocytes in particular are of utmost importance because they are responsible for the production of keratin, a structural protein without which much of our bodies would fail to function. One of the most crucial of keratin's properties is its strength even at very high temperatures.

This is because its toughness comes from its supercoiled nature in which the polymer is kept together through cross-linking brought on by both intermolecular forces and covalent bonding, as seen in the diagram. Covalent bonds form between sulfurs to result in disulfide bridges, which kept the protein rigid. However, even at the high temperatures of the body, the bonds stay as they are. Thus, the dissociation of the bonds is nonspontaneous, which means the value of change in Gibbs Free Energy is positive.

Furthermore, since such dissociation would result in more positional arrangements, entropy would increase and thus change in entropy is positive as well. This means that the sign of enthalpy must be positive or else the change in G would be negative, so the bond dissociation is endothermic. Eventually, at a high enough temperature, the bonds will dissociate because of this fact.