Fig. 6.

Histochemical analysis of reticular fibers and proteoglycans in the dermis of the four skin types analyzed in this work as determined by the Gomori’s reticulin and alcian blue methods, respectively. For Gomori’s reticulin, reticular fibers can be detected as thin black filaments (black arrows) that did not show significant differences among samples, although their presence was more abundant at dermal papillae suggesting that they could play an important role as basement membrane components. This method also stained some dermic collagen fibers in brown (white arrows). Similarly, very few differences were found for the alcian blue method, which stains acid proteoglycans of the dermis in blue color. DHS dorsal hand skin, PHS palmar hand skin, DFS dorsal foot skin, PFS plantar foot skin. Top panels correspond to low-magnification images of each skin type, whereas lower panels show higher magnifications of the same sample type. Scale bars: 100 µm