If a hydrophobic pollutant disrupts the skin's lipid bilayer, which consequence follows regarding the stratum corneum barrier?

💡 Explanation

Disruption of the lipid bilayer compromises the skin's permeability barrier, because the intercellular lipids prevent excessive water loss. Therefore, increased trans-epidermal water loss occurs, rather than enhanced peptide penetration or altered differentiation, which involve different mechanisms.

• Why does antibiotic resistance spread rapidly within bacterial biofilms under selective pressure?
• A patient with thrombocytosis (excess platelets) experiences increased risk of vascular occlusion. Why does platelet aggregation cause this heightened occlusion risk?
• Why does chronic primary hyperaldosteronism often result in sustained hypertension, even if arterial baroreceptors are functioning normally?
• Why does an individual with advanced osteoarthritis in their knee experience increased pain during activities requiring repetitive knee flexion, such as stair climbing or squatting?
• Why does calcium oxalate, rather than calcium phosphate, primarily form kidney stones in individuals with hypocitraturia?
• In skeletal muscle during intense chronic stress, why does protein degradation via the ubiquitin-proteasome pathway (UPP) accelerate relative to protein synthesis?