Microorganisms in the Skin Microbiome
Skin Microbiome is a group of organisms that live inside the human skin (Herd, 2018).
The microorganisms inhabit various regions of the skin such as the face, the back, and the chest
region, which are the oiliest parts of the body. They choose the area to live in depending on the
skin’s thickness, humidity, and texture. These microorganisms include bacteria such as the rod
proteobacteria and the round Staphylococcus spp, the Demodex folliculoeum and Demodex brevis
skin mites, protozoa, viruses, and fungi such as Malassezia spp. We can classify the microbes
into two groups, the transient bacteria and the resident germs that are harmless and beneficial to
the host. They play a crucial role in educating the T cells of the skin on how to fight pathogens
(Lee, 2014). The transient and the resident microbes are not pathogenic with proper hygiene
maintenance, intact skin barrier, and immune system. However, after skin alteration, the bacteria
can colonize, reproduce, and cause diseases to the host. The advance research of the skin
microbiota has given an insight into skin disorders and how best to treat them (Grice & Segre,
2013).
Laboratory methods can be used to identify microbes in an efficient manner. The
techniques include the molecular and culture-based methods. Culture-based approaches are
standard for characterizing microbial diversity (Kong & Segre, 2012). The technique involves
comprehensive surveys of the microbes. It identifies the skin microbes such as coagulase-
negative staphylococci and S. epidermidis and refers to the rest as skin colonizers. These are
bacteria of the genus Micrococcus and the phylum Actinobacteria. The S. aureus bacteria grow
well under controlled culture conditions and overcrowd the more demanding bacteria (Sohn,
2018). However, it faces various limitations since some bacteria, such as Treponema pallidum,
need fastidious growth conditions that are hard to provide through the comprehensive survey. It
MICROORGANISM IN THE SKIN CARE MICROBIOME
also isolates and identifies the Malassezia spp fungal species, which is prevalent in sebaceous
regions of the face.
