Development and Verification of Poroelastic Barrier Model With Active Transport: Application in Human Epidermis

Fundamental understanding of the mass transfer through the epidermis provides valuable information for different applications such as drug delivery, functioning artificial skin and thermal comfort. We propose a more detailed, physiologically motivated, model in which the outmost layer of the skin is treated as an active membrane rather than a passive one. Our work can be divided in two stages: (a) modeling of active mass transport through the viable epidermis, and (b) modeling of the swelling SC. In the former stage we assume that the epidermis consists of a triphasic medium in which live cells act as sources and sinks for water and solutes. The transepidermal transport is numerically solved after applying the method of volume averaging. The second stage involves the use of a model passive (acellular) material to develop the methodology necessary for the extraction of model parameters of any given tissue. We propose an integrated model of human epidermis including a swelling layer. The steady-state water mass fraction profiles obtained in vivo from Raman microscopy experiments are used to extract the model parameters. The verification of our work is achieved by successfully reproducing experimental data under transient conditions. Finally, numerical studies of water transport and redistribution in the epidermis subjected to external insults (change of water evaporation rate and surface hydration, and SC removal by stripping) are presented.

Name thesis:degree_name

Ph.D.

Level thesis:degree_level

Dissertation

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Mechanical Engineering

Grantor

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Year dc:date

2015

Author dc:creator

• Falkenberg, Cibele Vieira

Contributors dc:contributor

• Georgiadis, John G.

• Engineering, Biomedical

Language dc:language

eng

Identifier

(MiAaPQ)AAI3290230

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/83881