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In this issue

Healing Skin Wounds as Surrogate Biomarkers The dynamic process of tissue repair involves a protracted and orchestrated movement or proliferation of various cell types, including mast cells. Unlike the asynchronous onset of many grievous illnesses, a superficial skin wound can be used to control the induction of an insult and subsequently intervene in an activated, disease-related biological process. The Juan and Ng groups have invoked a wound healing model in mice and monkeys to measure the pharmacodynamic effect of a cKit-specific antibody and imatinib mesylate, two molecules that block the Stem Cell Factor-cKit axis. By implementing an automated laser scanning cytometry method to quantitate the drug effect on mast cell accumulation in situ, the assay avoids conventional pitfalls of attempting to measure circulating mast cell precursors or isolate mature mast cells from tissue. This proposed approach sets the stage for considering a wound healing model in the clinical phases of drug development.