skin

Sebum can be our friend when it is protecting our skin from infection or fungi, protecting from friction, and reducing TEWL, but it can be our enemy when it’s causing us shiny skin and acne pustules! As you can see from this picture, sebaceous glands are located in the hair follicles of our body. The...

“Trans-epidermal water loss (or TEWL) is defined as a measurement of the quantity of water that passes from inside a body through the epidermal layer to the surrounding atmosphere via diffusion and evaporation processes.” (Wikipedia) This is a continuous process over which we have little control. It can increase due to disruption to the skin...

If you’ve just joined us, please check out this post on the chemistry of your skin before reading onwards… If we think of the corneocytes in the stratum corneum as “bricks”, then the stratum corneum lipids are the mortar. (The water soluble natural moisturizing factor is found inside the corneocytes; the lipid soluble stratum corneum...

Natural moisturizing factor (NMF) is found within the corneocytes, and makes up 20% to 30% of the dry weight of the stratum corneum. It consists of amino acids (40%), sodium PCA (12%), lactate (12%), urea (7%), ions (18.5%), sugars (like glycerol – 8.5%), and a few other things. These are water soluble humectants (meaning they...

When your skin cells reach the top layer of the stratum corneum, they will sit there for about 14 days before sloughing off. This process is called desquamation or exfoliation. Interestingly enough, there is so much scientists don’t know about this process. Scientists know there are enzymes that will break the bonds between the corneocytes,...