Volatile organic compounds produced by human skin cells

Skin produces volatile organic compounds (VOCs) released to the environment with emission patterns
characteristic of climatic conditions. It could be thought that these compounds are intermediaries in cell
metabolism, since many intermediaries of metabolic pathways have a volatile potential.
In this work, using gas chromatography, we answered the question of whether VOC profiles of primary
cultures of human dermal fibroblasts were affected by the type of culture conditions. VOCs were determined
for different types of culture, finding significant differences between skin cells grown in classical monolayer
culture -2D- compared with 3D matrix immobilized cultures. This indicates that VOC profiles could provide
information on the physiological state of skin cells or skin.