Acne in Infancy and Acne Genetics

Abstract

Acne is a disease that can be seen in the first year of age, early childhood, prepubertal age and puberty. Neonatal acne is due mainly to considerable sebum excretion rate, and infantile acne because of high androgens of adrenal origin in girls and of adrenal and testes in boys. These pathogenic mechanisms are characteristic in these ages. Important factors like early onset of comedones and high serum levels of dehydroepiandrosterone sulfate are predictors of severe or long-standing acne in prepubertal age. Hereditary factors play an important role in acne. Neonatal, nodulocystic acne and conglobate acne has proven genetic influences. Postadolescent acne is related with a first-degree relative with the condition in 50% of the cases. Chromosomal abnormalities, HLA phenotypes, polymorphism of human cytochrome P-450 1A1 and MUC1 gene are involved in the pathogenesis of acne. Several other genes are being studied.

Two new susceptibility loci 1q24.2 and 11p11.2 confer risk to severe acne

“…Increasing evidence from large families and twins implicates genetic factors in the pathogenesis of acne 8,9 . Several candidate genes have thus far been implicated, which include tumour necrosis factor (TNF) 10,11 , tumour necrosis factor receptor 2 (TNFR2) 12 , tolllike receptor 2 (TLR2) 12 , interleukin 1-alpha (IL-1a) 13 , cytochrome P450 family 1 subfamily A polypeptide 1 (CYP1A1) 14 , cytochrome P450 family 17 subfamily A polypeptide 1 (CYP17A1) 15 , cytochrome P450 family 21 subfamily A polypeptide 2 (CYP21A2) 16 and androgen receptor (AR) 17 .…”

Pediatric Acne

“…It is more frequently seen in newborn boys than in girls [2]. The incidence of neonatal acne diagnosed based on the presence of comedone lesions is approximately 20% in newborns [3].…”

“…The treatment of acne is debate in these age groups, because of the possible adverse effects of the medications. Pediatric acne becomes a greater issue because it has a wide spectrum of differential diagnosis and could be associated with underlying systemic abnormalities [1][2][3].…”

Pathogenese und Therapie der Akne: Aktuelle Aspekte

“…Gefunden wurden verschiedene genetische Polymorphismen. Es wird angenommen, dass für verschiedene Akne−Formen unterschiedliche genetische Dispositionen ver− antwortlich sein könnten (wie A. neonatorum, infantilis, Puber− täts−A., A. conglobata) [6]. Wenn man nach Defekten der 21−Hy− droxylase sucht, findet man diese insbesondere bei Patienten mit fehlendem Ansprechen auf eine adäquate Behandlung [7 ± 9].…”