Asian Skin Biobank: Creating Customized ‘LIVING’ Skin-In-A-Dish

Skin ageing, or skin disorders such as eczema, hyperpigmentation, and scarring, vary among ethnicities; most research studies and product development are performed on skin samples of Caucasian origin. Commercially available skin models are limited in diversity and are not customizable. Meanwhile, it is challenging for researchers to create reproducible 3D skin-mimetic models that meet ethical, consumer, regulatory, and competitive needs.

The Asia-Pacific beauty and personal care products which are currently valued at USD 164 billion with a projected to grow of over 6% over the next five years is driving the cosmetic industries and pharm-biotech to provide safe and personalized solutions to the Asian-specific market.

Hence, building a unique and diverse Skin Bank of Asian origin has a critical value proposition for the market and the research community.

The Asian Skin Biobank (ASB) is a core technology platform within the Skin Research Institute of Singapore (SRIS), with a unique collection of high-quality and safe skin cells derived from diverse Asian ethnicities, age groups, and body sites. The ASB uses this human cell resource to create robust and customizable in vitro skin models and assays that are utilized for fundamental-to-translational research activities.

Our Uniqueness: Diverse Asian Skin

Leveraging our strong network with local hospitals in Singapore, the ASB gets a continuous supply of waste surgical skin tissues from various Asian ethnicities, mainly of Chinese, Malay, and Indian origin. The diversity of donor’s age and body sites gives us access to a wide range of skin samples with different pigmentation levels, thickness, hair, and solar UV exposure.

Skin tissues are immediately processed in our ISO-7 certified clean laboratory following strict operating procedures and quality controls upon reception. Valuable donor-matched skin cells (mainly fibroblasts, keratinocytes and melanocytes) are isolated, expanded and banked to build various skin models and assays for diverse applications.

The diverse Asian skin samples and assays are provided to the research community through collaborations using a working process, as shown below.

We collaborated with the SRIS based on their reputation for wound care research in Asia. Using an appropriate in-vitro wound model, the team provided further evidence that Accel-Heal electrical stimulation accelerates wound healing. The outcome of this study is to create greater awareness among clinicians about this therapy to build a stronger proposition for its inclusion within wound care protocols.

Paul McKenna, Commercial Director at Accel-Heal Technologies

The Knowhow: From 2D Cell Cultures to Complex 3D Skin Models

With more than 20,000 vials of primary skin cells, the ASB can create customizable (or tailor-made) Asian skin models relevant for research studies on skin ageing, inflammation, wound healing and testing new cosmetic products and therapeutics.

Depending on the needs and objectives, the ASB designs and develops skin models with different levels of complexity and performance. Skin cells can be grown as a single layer on a plastic dish or seeded in a collagen-based matrix to reconstruct 3D full-thickness skin.

3D bioprinting, a computer-controlled process that enables accurate placement of different cell types and biomaterials, is also optimized to produce next-generation biomimetic skin constructs.

Variety of skin models offered by the ASB, ranging from 2D cell cultures (fibroblasts, keratinocytes, and melanocytes), to complex 3D reconstructed skin and ex vivo skin explants. (photo courtesy: Asian Skin Biobank)

One of the primary reasons for choosing SRIS is that they possess a first-of-its-kind wound healing platform that captures many of the features of chronic human wounds, unlike existing platform technologies. This has allowed us to test the efficacy of our regenerative extract better and provide more accurate data that will be used in our upcoming clinical trials.

Mr. Winston Lumenta, Head of Corporate Development at Celligenics

Our services: What We Offer

Besides high-quality and reproducible skin models, the ASB provides academics and companies access to various testing platforms to investigate the skin structure and critical functions, the skin barrier integrity, permeability, and repair.

We offer capabilities that allow accelerated skin research and application approaches to claim safe and cruelty-free testing labels for any product based on scientific research. The diversity of our test-bed ranges from cosmetics to proof of concept of a research idea, as summarised below.

The ASB’s capabilities could be applied to wide range of tests and study platforms as illustrated in the above picture gallery.

ASB Impact at A Glance

ASB in tune with Asia

High-quality research data is essential for developing next-generation therapeutics and technologies for the pharma and beauty industry. ASB has the highest repertoire of skin samples from Asian origin populations catering to skin diagnostic and drug screening assay platforms and provides robust and diverse skin models for local and global research. Our deep insights into skin science and know-how aim to anchor ASB as a global Skin Biobank and the collaborative partner of choice for industry and academics.

A*SRL collaborates with public sector, the medical community and industry, and contributes actively to the Skin Research Institute of Singapore (SRIS) - a collaboration between A*STAR, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, and the National Healthcare Group. SRIS brings together biologists, engineers, and clinicians to tackle clinically important questions in skin research.