This Jello-O like structure, sometimes called the ‘ground substance’ gives final form to what goes over our musculo-skeletal architecture. It is the most significant and least understood component in our physiology. But one thing is definitive: it is the key to our health and aging. The central nervous system runs through it and together this is who we are and what we see of one another.

The ECM of our skin is an ocean of signals that contains the collagens, elastins, sugars, lipids, cells and waste products. It is an extraordinary evolutionary development; or, it was created in one swoop by the One Great Magician. But either way, it is the most dynamic biological circus anywhere and easily rivals the brain, of which it shares history, in complexity.

The ECM promotes signals back and forth between cells, for good and bad. In so doing, it also has great influence on what goes on inside the cells. Cells that are in a chronic state of alarm can weaken whole areas of the ECM. Inflammation of the skin is more than a surface problem, it is a signal cascade that can affect our entire well-being. We are not a collection of islands, we are an organically connected body mass. Inflammation itself is not well defined, either chemically or morphologically. But we know that inflammation problems lead to cancer, which itself is simply unregulated cell growth, that is, cell division wildly out of control. Cancer spreads from one area to another in ways that demonstrate dramatically our interconnected ECM.

Topical product skin addiction is more than a localized troubling event. It is a noisy alarm in the ECM that results in sacrifice of an area to protect the entire organism. Aging may be better described as a series of area shut downs brought on by inflammation that weakened day by day the entire body. Inflammation is poorly described, less understood and has more say in our lives than any other dynamic force. It is at the intersection of the environment and our natural resilience and is never recognized until things have gotten seriously out of whack.

Any student of skincare must begin with the study of the extracellular matrix. It will be a fascinating journey into the unknown and unexplained. Few go there or stay for long, because even short visits quickly challenge the pet theories of today’s biologic sciences.

Shamans are able to diagnose diseases arising deep within us based on observations solely of our skin. They seem to have a better understanding than even our most advanced clinics. Failure to understand the organizational and ongoing dynamics in the ECM complex continue to hurt medical advancement.

This is a great subject area for students to search the internet and read the many excellent journal articles published free at the NIH. Go back to 1990 and work your way forward to see how this area has grown in importance and understanding. We are a hundred years from real comprehension of the complexity here, that interestingly, no amount of computational biology will ever resolve given the idiopathic nature of the ECM. Complexity in biochemical processes is only now being admitted, at long last. We are not biological units composed of binary switchgear. The ECM makes that abundantly clear.