Department of Otolaryngology, SUNY, SUNY Downstate College of Medicine, Kings County Hospital Center, 450 Clarkson Avenue, PO Box 126, Brooklyn, NY 11203, USA.
Resident Physician, Departmentof Otolaryngology, SUNY Downstate Medical Center, 450 Clarkson Avenue, Box 126, Brooklyn, NY 11203, USA.
Otolaryngol Clin North Am. 2023 Oct;56(5):863-867. doi: 10.1016/j.otc.2023.06.005. Epub 2023 Jul 28.
The external canal is a unique environment that has an elaborate mechanism for self-cleaning and protection. The fundamental basis of this is the epithelial migration of the desquamating layers of the keratinizing epithelium that lines the entire canal and ear drum. This migratory movement results in a "conveyor belt" effect where the dead skin is moved out of the bony ear canal to the cartilaginous portion, where it is lifted off with the help of glandular skin secretions and the hairs of the canal to form what we call "ear wax." The ear wax has numerous protective properties and is essential to the health of the external ear. The protective properties are due to chemical properties of the wax, in addition to intrinsic chemical secretions by the sebaceous and cerumen apocrine glands. The protection also comes from a diverse population of organisms that exist in the external ear that are usually saprophytic, commensal, and symbiotic, but in some cases, they can become parasitic and pathologic. Detection and quantification of the members of this biome has been difficult, and their overall role in the normal biome of the ear and their transition into pathogens remain an area of active research and investigation.
外耳道是一个独特的环境，具有精细的自我清洁和保护机制。其基本基础是角化上皮的脱屑层沿着整个耳道和鼓膜进行的上皮迁移。这种迁移运动产生了一种“输送带”效应，即死皮从骨性耳道移动到软骨部分，在腺体皮肤分泌物和耳道毛发的帮助下被清除，形成我们所谓的“耳垢”。耳垢具有许多保护特性，对耳朵的健康至关重要。保护特性不仅归因于耳垢的化学特性，还归因于皮脂腺和大汗腺的固有化学分泌物。保护作用还来自于存在于外耳中的大量生物体，它们通常是腐生、共生和共生的，但在某些情况下，它们可能会变成寄生和病理状态。这个生物群落成员的检测和定量一直很困难，它们在外耳正常生物群落中的整体作用及其向病原体的转变仍然是一个活跃的研究和调查领域。
