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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2015 Aug 24.
Published in final edited form as: Environ Sci Process Impacts. 2014 Feb;16(2):341–351. doi: 10.1039/c3em00570d

Fig. 1.

Fig. 1

A paradigm for measurement of skin exposure to metal sensitizers. Particles [denoted as ●] deposit on the outer stratum corneum (SC) at some mass loading (Mtotal). Depending upon the loading, all or just a fraction of these particles will contact the skin surface film liquids (SSFLs). This fraction of particles in contact with SSFLs represents the biorelevant fraction (fbiorelevant). i.e., the material available to react with skin liquids. A portion of fbiorelevant will undergo dissolution (oxidation or reduction) to form bioaccessible (fbioaccessible) water soluble metal ions [denoted as ●+]. Depending upon the properties of the metal ions (formation of complexes. etc.) and the barrier properties of the SC some portion will penetrate through or around corneocyte cells and reach the underlying viable epidermis (VE) and interact with the immune system (fbioavailable).