Research Team Wins Heinz Maurer Award for Linking Bacterium to Eczema Barrier Failure

Using Lipotype's lipidomics platform, scientists map how Staphylococcus hominis affects the skin's lipid environment in atopic dermatitis, opening promising pathways for eczema treatment

DRESDEN, Germany, Sept. 01, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Prof. Dr. Natalie Garzorz-Stark and Prof. Dr. Felix Lauffer have received the Heinz Maurer Award for Dermatological Research for linking a skin bacterium to lipid barrier breakdown in eczema. The €20,000 award, presented at the International Summer Academy of Practical Dermatology in Munich, Germany, recognises their publication "Skin Lipid-Microbe Interplay Links Staphylococcus hominis to Barrier Control in Adult Atopic Dermatitis," published in Allergy in 2026.

Atopic dermatitis, the most common form of eczema, causes the skin’s protective barrier to break down, making it more prone to inflammation, irritation, and immune reactions. Despite decades of research, the precise mechanisms behind this failure remain unclear. For the first time, the study maps how a common skin bacterium actively shapes the lipid environment of affected skin, linking the rarely combined fields of microbiology and lipidomics.

The team combined lipidomics, profiling the fatty molecules forming the skin's outermost layer, with microbiome profiling, identifying bacterial communities on the skin's surface. Both were performed on the same patients' samples, yielding lipid-microbe interaction networks across the cohort.

Lipotype GmbH provided its high-resolution shotgun lipidomics platform, leveraging tape-strip samples to generate quantitative lipid profiles without biopsies. These were cross-referenced with 16S amplicon sequencing data to map interactions.

The analysis reveals a surprising finding: Staphylococcus hominis, found on both healthy and diseased skin, had not previously been linked to atopic dermatitis. Yet it emerges as a regulator of lipid composition, influencing how skin cells differentiate and how inflammation is sustained during barrier breakdown in eczema.

The findings open a new area of research for atopic dermatitis and other skin diseases, with implications beyond anti-inflammatory therapies. The study involved the Technical University of Munich, the University of Freiburg, and the Helmholtz Center Munich in Germany, together with the Karolinska Institute in Sweden.

The Heinz Maurer Award has supported dermatological research since 1996, awarded biennially by Sebapharma GmbH & Co. KG for work on skin surface and barrier function.

Contact: Olya Vvedenskaya, MD, PhD, Senior communications manager, Lipotype GmbH
Email: vvedenskaya@lipotype.com
Phone: +49 1525 7091457