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Acne is the bane of existence for most teenagers and many adults, affecting about 80 percent of Americans during their lifetimes. Yet 1 in 5 people never suffer from so much as a blemish. What's the difference between them and the rest of us?

Researchers from the University of California, Los Angeles decided to attempt to answer just this question. Using over-the-counter skin-cleansing strips, researchers lifted the bacteria from the noses of 49 spotty volunteers and 52 clear-skinned ones. Researchers used this information to record the strains of bacteria on each person's skin and whether or not they suffered from acne.

"We learned that not all acne bacteria trigger pimples - one strain may help keep skin healthy," principal investigator Huiying Li, an assistant professor at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, said in a statement. "We hope to apply our findings to develop new strategies that stop blemishes before they start, and enable dermatologists to customize treatment to each patient's unique cocktail of skin bacteria."

After identifying over 1,000 different strains of bacteria living on the surface of people's skin, scientists from the Washington University sequenced the genome of 66 of them. Interestingly, the bacteria strains in the acne-ridden and the clear-skinned volunteers appeared to differ. In fact, 1 in 5 of the volunteers with acne had two unique strains of Propionibacterium acnes, the bacteria that live deep in human pores and can cause redness and inflammation if they trigger the immune system.

But the most exciting discovery was of a third strain of bacteria. "We were extremely excited to uncover a third strain of P. acnes that's common in healthy skin yet rarely found when acne is present," Li stated. "We suspect that this strain contains a natural defense mechanism that enables it to recognize attackers and destroy them before they infect the bacterial cell." Researchers believe that this strain of bacteria can protect the skin much in the same way that the live cultures in yogurt protect the gut.

Researchers hope to use this information to create a probiotic cream that will be able to stop pimples before they start and to prevent bad bacteria from invading.

The study was published in the Journal of Investigative Dermatology.