Ward2019_Article_MathematicalModellingOfContact.pdf (2.31 MB)
Mathematical modelling of contact dermatitis from nickel and chromium
journal contribution
posted on 2019-03-18, 14:06 authored by John WardJohn Ward, S.J. Franks, M.J. Tindall, J.R. King, A. Curtis, G.S. EvansDermal exposure to metal allergens can lead to irritant (ICD) and allergic contact dermatitis
(ACD). In this paper we present a mathematical model of the absorption of metal ions, hexavalent
chromium and nickel, into the viable epidermis and compare the localised irritant and T-lymphocyte
(T-cell) mediated immune responses. The model accounts for the spatial-temporal variation of skin
health, extra and intracellular allergen concentrations, innate immune cells, T-cells, cytokine signalling and lymph node activity up to about 6 days after contact with these metals; repair processes
associated with withdrawal of exposure to both metals is not considered in the current model, being
assumed secondary during the initial phases of exposure. Simulations of the resulting system of PDEs
are studied in one-dimension, i.e. across skin depth, and three-dimensional scenarios with the aim of
comparing the responses to the two ions in the cases of first contact (no T-cells initially present) and
second contact (T-cells initially present). The results show that on continuous contact, chromium ions
elicit stronger skin inflammation, but for nickel, subsequent re-exposure stimulates stronger responses
due to an accumulation of cytotoxic T-cell mediated responses which characterise ACD. Furthermore,
the surface area of contact to these metals has little effect on the speed of response, whilst sensitivity
is predicted to increase with the thickness of skin. The modelling approach is generic and should be
applicable to describe contact dermatitis from a wide range of allergens.
History
School
- Science
Department
- Mathematical Sciences
Published in
Journal of Mathematical BiologyVolume
79Issue
2Pages
595–630Citation
WARD, J.P. ... et al., 2019. Mathematical modelling of contact dermatitis from nickel and chromium. Journal of Mathematical Biology, 79 (2), pp.595–630.Publisher
Springer (© the authors)Version
- VoR (Version of Record)
Publisher statement
This work is made available according to the conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) licence. Full details of this licence are available at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Acceptance date
2019-04-08Publication date
2019-06-13Copyright date
2019Notes
This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made.ISSN
0303-6812eISSN
1432-1416Publisher version
Language
- en