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. 2025 Aug 28.
doi: 10.1111/all.70028. Online ahead of print.

Skin Lipid-Microbe Interplay Links Staphylococcus hominis to Barrier Control in Adult Atopic Dermatitis

Madhumita Bhattacharyya  1   2 , Felix Lauffer  3   4 , Manja Jargosch  4   5 , Kristina Frey  4 , Mahsa Shahidi Dadras  6 , Theresa Raunegger  4 , Sophia Wasserer  4 , Carsten B Schmidt-Weber  5 , Tilo Biedermann  4 , Kilian Eyerich  6   7 , Stefanie Eyerich  5 , Claudia Traidl-Hoffmann  1   2   8 , Christian Klose  9 , Matthias Reiger  1   2   8 , Natalie Garzorz-Stark  4   6   7
Affiliations

Skin Lipid-Microbe Interplay Links Staphylococcus hominis to Barrier Control in Adult Atopic Dermatitis

Madhumita Bhattacharyya et al. Allergy. .

Abstract

Background: Skin surface lipids and commensal microbes are essential for the epidermal barrier, but their mutual interactions remain poorly understood.

Methods: We conducted high-resolution shotgun lipidomics of tape strips from lesional and non-lesional atopic dermatitis (AD) skin and healthy controls. Lipidomic data were integrated with 16S amplicon sequencing to construct lipid-microbe interaction networks.

Results: AD skin showed disease-specific lipid-microbe correlations, with less diverse interactions in lesional compared to non-lesional and healthy skin. Staphylococcus hominis (S. hominis) negatively correlated with non-hydroxy-dehydrosphingosine (NdS) 18:0;2/24:0;0 and positively with diacylglycerol (DAG) 18:1;0_18:1;0 and DAG 16:0;0_18:1;0. In vitro co-cultures of reconstructed human epidermis (RHE) with AD skin-derived T cell supernatant (TCS) and S. hominis reduced RHE thickness, spongiosis, and NdS 18:0;2/24:0;0 levels. Furthermore, S. hominis directly lowered NdS 18:0;2/24:0;0 levels in lesional AD skin tape samples, and reversed type 2 inflammation and lipid metabolism gene expression in TCS-stimulated RHE.

Conclusions: These findings identify S. hominis as a key regulator of lipid-microbe interactions in AD, influencing epidermal inflammation and differentiation.

Keywords: Staphylococcus hominis; atopic dermatitis; lipidomics; microbiome.

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