Reversal of cortisone-mediated decrease in dermal total collagen content upon treatment with selected compounds.

Human skin biopsies were treated topically with 4 μL of 10 μM or 100 μM of the selected compounds for 6 days. After the first 24 h of incubation with the inhibitors, the skin samples were simultaneously treated with inhibitor and 100 nM cortisone for the remaining 5 days. Dermal collagen content was semi-quantitatively assessed by Picrosirius Red histochemical staining. Data represent mean ± SEM from 6 human biopsies. Shapiro-Wilk test indicated that the data followed a normal distribution and unpaired t-test was used to test for significant differences. # p<0.01 compared to vehicle control in the absence of cortisone; * p<0.05, ** p<0.01, *** p<0.001 compared to cortisone treated vehicle control.