In front of this assembly of scientists, Fabrice Lefevre presented his whole six-year research project aimed to understand a number of adaptation mechanisms specific to humans.

Skin and brain: a permanent dialogue

He started by showing a picture… At first, it looked like that of a brain, but on the contrary, he emphasized it actually represented our skin!
‘If we go back to the origins of embryogenesis,’ he explained , ‘we need to bear in mind that during the development of the embryo, a tissue, the ectoderm, produces both the neuroectoderm (at the origin of the whole nervous, central, and peripheral system, i.e. the brain and nerves) and the epidermis (skin layer).’
All this reminds us that the skin and brain intrinsically have the exact same biological origin. As a matter of fact, there is an expression that translates this reality perfectly well: ‘my nerves are all on edge’. And there is actually a whole branch of the peripheral nervous system in the dermis and epidermis.

A spate of interactions

Of course, it would be simplistic to say that brain-skin communication only depends on the nerves, that is, on a purely bioelectric pathway. In fact, during the evolution, it adapted …