Compared to the bony plates of an armadillo or the hard scales of a pangolin or even the tough, leathery skin of an Indian elephant, the thin layer of delicate epidermis that makes up our outermost covering may seem like pretty wimpy protection from the outside world.
Except, all we have to do is take a closer look at our silky-smooth skin to see that it actually is a small patch of scaly armor.
Those scales are made out of the same hard protein, called keratin, as the scales of pangolins and other animals.
Of course, ours are a lot thinner, and therefore more fragile, but that isn't normally a problem, because we don't regularly need to survive this.
Our scales also don't have to be super durable because our body produces a brand new layer of tens of millions of them every day.
The giant, never-ending task of producing this armor is carried out by an equally giant and never-ending army of skin cells in the underlying epidermis.
Every second, some 500 new cells split off from stem cells at the base of the epidermis and join this army, gradually migrating to the surface of your skin as younger cells form beneath and push them upwards.
The journey to the top is one of ultimate sacrifice.
In order to form a protective barrier between you and the world, each cell is programmed to systematically destroy itself as it nears the skin's surface, using enzymes to dismantle its vital parts and essentially converting it into a hard, flat shield.
In the process, it attaches itself to surrounding cells via whisker-like projections and releases packets of soft fat to fill the spaces between cells.
