1992 Jakubovic H, Ackerman AB

 
Structure and function of skin: Development, morphology and physiology. In Dermatology, 3rd ed, edited by Moschella and Hurley, 1992 (Fig. 15).

View Figure  		Fig. 15  (orig. Fig. 1–63) Mantles at various stages of differentiation are pictured in these photomicrographs taken at low (A) and high (B) magnifications. Mantles are the structures that emanate from bases of follicular infundibula and hang like cloaks or arms on both sides of the lower segments of follicles. Initially, mantles consist of cords of undifferentiated epithelial cells. In time, those cells become vacuolated, and eventually, what was once devoid of character becomes fully mature sebaceous glands and ducts. That sequence is portrayed here, from undifferentiated cords to large sebaceous lobules.
 

Message

 
Mantles consist at first of cords of undifferentiated epithelial cells. In time, those cells become vacuolated and eventuate in fully mature sebaceous glands and ducts. The stages in differentiation of sebaceous units imply a cycle of mantle epithelium.
 

Critique

 
The authors, like Felix Pinkus and Zimmermann before them, interpreted the mantle as the precursor of sebaceous glands, but their interpretation is only partially correct. Furthermore, what they illustrated as evolution of mantle epithelium really was involution of that epithelium.
 
There are no mantles in an embryo, only a middle bulge which develops into fully formed sebaceous glands and ducts. During the first few weeks of postnatal life, sebaceous glands are present as a result of the effects of maternal androgens that crossed the placenta. When those androgens are degraded, sebaceous glands in an infant regress and mantles represent the residuum of them. At puberty, androgens from testes and ovaries induce mantles to mature from undifferentiated sebaceous cells into fully formed sebaceous glands and ducts. Near middle age, as the effects of gonadal androgens wane, sebaceous units involute for a second time and the end stage, once again, is mantles.