This article is only available in the PDF format. Download the PDF to view the article, as well as its associated figures and tables.
The diverse and complex functionality of the keratinocyte could serve as the basis for an entire library of books. Therefore, it was a challenging task for the editors of this multiauthored review to organize even the "endocrine, metabolic, and immunologic" functions of the keratinocyte into a single representative text.
In the introductory chapter, Dr Milstone emphasizes the role of the keratinocyte as an effector cell and sets as one goal of the text to compile a current catalogue of these functions. Most of this goal is met; however, very little is said about the role of adhesion molecule expression and regulation with respect to epidermal cells and their interactions with each other and with leukocytes. Rather than being an oversight, this was probably due to the fact that most of the literature in this area is less than 2 years old.
The information on epidermal cytokines is particularly complete, for