 Researchers at Mississippi State University described a separation of the upper and lower dermis associated with a loose packing of collagen fibrils in a one-year-old filly with hyperelastosis cutis.In 2004, clinical veterinarians at the University of California, Davis first coined the term hereditary equine regional dermal asthenia (HERDA) after examining 50 horses with stereotypical presentation of the disease.Shortened and thinned collagen fibrils in the deep dermis was the significant characteristic shared among the affected skin of diseased horses.