Edinburgh Napier University

  Harmful disparities exist in skin health and wound healing care which increase morbidity and mortality for people especially those with dark skin tones. This harmful care is largely caused by the gaps in skin research, resulting in limited wider knowledge and understanding of the skin biology of people with dark skin tones. A key issue is the limited insight into the role of the skin microbiome in healthy ageing for people with dark skin tones. This is exacerbated by additional shortcomings in knowledge about the composition of the skin structure, function and microbiome in dark skin tones. This mixed exploratory sequential study will address these issues by investigating the extent to which the diversity of the wider population is reflected in research about the skin microbiome’s role in healthy ageing.