Theory of skin electroporation: Implications of straight-through aqueous pathway segments that connect adjacent corneocytes

Abstract

Previous in vitro experiments have shown that transdermal high-voltage pulses (U(skin) ≃100 V; duration ≃1 ms) create local transport regions (LTR) away from appendages in human skin. Quantitative interpretation of the associated ionic and molecular transport led to the view that a large number of aqueous pathways were created, and these connect the corneocytes within an LTR. Here we use the 'brick wall' model of the stratum corneum, modified so that morphology important to understanding electrical behavior is emphasized. In this model a minimum-size LTR is regarded as an idealized stack of corneocytes in which the 5-6 multilamellar lipid bilayer membranes between adjacent corneocytes are electroporated. As in artificial planar bilayer and cell membrane electroporation, a distribution of pathway sizes is expected during pulsing, and during recovery after pulsing individual pathway segments are expected to shrink and close randomly, with a time constant τ(seg) that depends on temperature and on lipid composition. Numerical simulations based on stochastic closure of individual segments were used to predict the electrical conductance G(LTR) (t) of a minimum-size LTR after pulsing stops. These theoretical results show that simple exponential decay, G(LTR)(t) = G(LTR)(0)exp(-t/τ(seg)), occurs with minimal fluctuations if the number of pathways is large (n(p) > 102), but for much smaller values the conduction decreases erratically. A 'stochastic bottleneck' leading to complete closure is reached only at about n(p) < 3. Thus, for the same number of electrically created pathways, the stratum corneum will remain 'open' longer if the pathways are located within an LTR than if the same number of pathways are distributed sparsely over the skin. These predictions are relevant to postpulse transport, including the trapping of linear macromolecules that can hold pathway segments open for prolonged intervals.