FEATURE ARTICLES

Martin Scott Cardinali and Tak Yu (Fiona) Lam – National Starch and Chemical Company, USA

Cosmetic formulators throughout the world are increasingly facing diverse demands from their customers, marketing managers, and other interested parties. Formulators are expected to deliver products with increasingly sophisticated performance, while also making use of more and more naturally derived ingredients to satisfy expectations for health, safety, and environmental responsibility. This creates a formidable challenge to raw material suppliers to the personal care industry – to develop new naturally derived ingredients that cost-effectively deliver outstanding performance benefits in complex finished goods.

Harry Wu, Daniel Guan, Cathy Du – Merck

Skin brightening is always the hot-point of skin care topics. With thousands of skin brightening products and methods existing in the market, we can see some new trends coming forth:

Anthony C. Dweck FLS FRSC FRSH – Technical Editor

Mention the word “naturals” and the first thought that comes into many minds would be plants, botanicals and herbal materials. The next thought would probably be essential oils and after a little more deliberation the idea of honey, seaweeds and sea salts would form. However, there are many interesting materials that do not grow in the soil but are a part of the geology. It was felt that a review of the use of minerals, earths, metals, semi-precious stones and gems in personal care products might be useful.

Joseph Albanese, Daniel Cantalupi, Nancy Clements, Christine Monro – ISP

Rheology modifiers are no longer expected to just thicken, suspend and stabilise formulations. They must also function over a broad pH range and be compatible with a variety of ingredients. Ideally, rheology modifiers are also expected to deliver consumer perceivable benefits to personal care formulations, while still delivering superior aesthetic properties including clarity in aqueous solutions.

Evelyn G. Su Ph.D. – Sino Lion (USA), Xue Hongyu and Wei Yi – Nanjing Zhongshi Chemical Co

There is no doubt that all kinds of microorganisms are widely spread around us. Microorganisms exist in used or unused cosmetic and personal care products, and the common forms of microorganisms are bacteria (either gram positive or gram negative), mould, and yeast. Some microbes are harmless, but some, such as Staphylococcus aureus, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, are greatly harmful to human beings. The need for preservatives in cosmetic and personal care products is to protect the consumer from contaminated products, i.e. to protect the product from microbial contamination.

PCHi is an international event of high status that features a major exhibition, conference sessions, workshops and many technical presentations. Entrance to the exhibition is free. PCHi will provide visitors with invaluable access to technical information and skills that will enhance their knowledge and ultimately make possible what they want to achieve.

Doug Mende – Managing Director, Mende-Biotech, New Zealand

Totarol, an aromatic diterpenoid with chemical formula C20H30O,1 is a natural extract from heartwood of the Totara tree (Podocarpus totara).2 The tree is a podocarp, unique to New Zealand, and has an ancient lineage up to 100 million years ago.

Alexander Chan Ph.D., Sean Kung Ph.D. – Jos H. Lowenstein & Sons Inc., USA

Hair colour technology was introduced in the 19th Century1 and experienced slow market growth at the onset. The 1950s saw hair colorants gain better acceptance in the consumer market, although mainly as a means of camouflaging grey hair. Not until increased R&D effort and new products entered the market did hair colorants become a part of daily cosmetics. Today, hair colouring has become a fashion trend, leading to the strong growth of hair colorants in the hair care category and the current multi-billion dollar industry.

Jonathan Regev – Jojoba Israel

Jojoba oil is very similar to the natural oil our skin produces, though it is technically a liquid wax produced from the seed of the Jojoba (Simmondsia chinensis) shrub.

Marc Heidl Ph.D. – Pentapharm, Switzerland

Mimic wrinkles are part of the visible face wrinkles. As time passes, these wrinkles persist permanently and become deeper and deeper: frown lines, laughter lines and crow’s feet appear more and more due to the repeated movements of facial muscles.

Manfred Axterer, Cornelia Müller – Symrise GmbH & Co KG Anthony C. Dweck FLS FRSC FRSH – Technical Editor

The mechanism by which the skin becomes irritated and inflamed is both complex and dependent on numerous factors.

Wing Li, Clara Goh, Jennifer Amos, Susan Jordan, Alan Theis, Cal Davis – Dow Chemical

Examined in this article is the maximising of the performance of shampoo with the appropriate matching of optimum silicone particle size and cationic polymer structure.

Robert McEldowney – Essential Oils of Tasmania Pty Ltd

Lavender is an ancient herb with a long history of use in fragrance, medicinal, culinary and aromatherapy applications.

Dr Arturo Puig, Dr José María García-Antón, Montserrat Mangues – Lipotec S.A.

The formation of wrinkles is the most easily visible sign of skin ageing.

Beth Johnson – Dow Corning Corporation, USA Stephane Van Oycke – Dow Corning S.A., Belgium

Over the past decade, the global hair care market has evolved rapidly as competition increases and formulators strive to meet specialised regional needs.

3. Mas-Chamberlin, Ph. Mondon, O. Peschard, F. Lamy and K. Lintner – Sederma SAS, France

Skin is notably elastic, but there are limits to its capacity to stretch. One such limit is evident in the visible skin blemishes generally called “stretch marks” (striae distensae or striae gravidorum).

Anthony Ansaldi, Marie Yednak-Carpenter – Presperse, USA

Mascara is one of the most commonly used cosmetics for the eyes. In modern mascara formulations the purpose of mascara is to darken, lengthen, and thicken the eyelashes. For decades formulators have been working on attaining these attributes while trying to eliminate some of the problems associated with mascara such as smudging, difficult removal, clumping etc. In order to solve these problems and provide the consumer with the benefits they are looking for, mascaras must be carefully formulated to allow easy and even application without smudging.

Dr Cornelia Huber – Pentapharm, Basel, Switzerland

Besides other environmental stress factors, UV radiation – even at low doses – is the main origin for DNA damage in human skin. These stress factors increase free radical levels in the cells, leading to the formation of 8-oxo-2’- deoxyguanosine (8-oxo-dG [Fig. 1]) and single-strand breaks. Cyclopyrimidine dimers directly result from UV radiation energy.1

"Our skin is our most visible feature and the most susceptible to the damaging effects of the sun’s UV rays. It is important then, that we protect our skin from these effects to maintain both our health and our beauty. One way to do this is through the use of sunscreens." -Maria Theresa Luna-Lumain and Kimberly Smith – DSM Nutritional Products

Marlies Regiert – Wacker Chemie AG, Germany

Cyclodextrins (CDs) are probably the most commercially important example of compounds that form host-guest complexes. In the cosmetic industry this ability of CDs to form inclusion complexes with a broad variety of organic compounds is used to increase stability and solubility of cosmetic actives and also decrease sensitivity to light and oxidation. The non-covalent inclusion complexes can have physical, chemical and biological properties that are dramatically different from those of either the parent cosmetic actives or cyclodextrins.