SKIN CARE
Safety & effectiveness of fullerene cosmetics
Dr Shinobu Ito - ITO Provitamin Research Centre, Japan
Fullerenes are allotropes of the same carbon as diamond and graphite, and are present in plants carbonised by lightning strikes or in special minerals. There are two types of fullerenes currently on the market: ‘fullerenes’, a complex of C60
only of C60 or C70 (Figure 1). They have a spherical , C70
structure that is completely different from needle-shaped carbon nanotubes. They are used in various fields because of their high oxidation- reduction (redox) performance. Formulations containing fullerenes have
been sold in skin care cosmetics in the US and Asia since 2005, but the EU does not yet recognise fullerene as a cosmetic ingredient. The EU Scientific Committee on Consume Safety (SCCS) issued a document entitled ‘Request for a Scientific Opinion on Fullerenes and Hydroxylated Fullerenes’ on 6 July 2021, and this is presumed to confirm their safety.
Safety tests on fullerenes Kato investigated the biological safety of fullerenes dispersed in squalene (fullerenes/ squalane) for mutagenesis, phototoxicity and permeability to human skin tissues. In a human skin biopsy incorporated into a diffusion chamber, when fullerenes/squalane containing 223 ppm C60
was administered, C60 penetrated
the epidermis at 33.6 nmol/g-tissue (24.2 ppm). However, it was not detected in the dermis, even after 24 hours.
A
Inflammatory cascade
UV Laser ROS
PKC-MAPK IL-1β-Ifn-γ
COX-2
IL-4 PGE2
Erythema Skin , etc., and ‘fullerene’, which consists
17
Fullerene C60 Figure 1: Fullerene
HPLC analysis suggested that fullerenes/ squalane penetrated the epidermis through the stratum corneum but could not reach the dermis because it could not penetrate the basement membrane. This shows that it is not necessary to consider the toxicity of fullerene C60
due to
systemic circulation through the cutaneous veins and that fullerenes/squalane does not have significant biologically toxic effects.1 From the above results, the toxicity of the due to skin irritation, eye irritation
fullerene C60
B 8 6 4 2 0
Mean ± SE of 5 experiments
and skin sensitisation is low, and it can be safely incorporated into cosmetics. Furthermore, since the cosmetic compounding concentration proposed by VC60 was 1% (2 ppm), the safety factor was 100 times higher than that in the safety test using the bulk powder, with almost 100% purity.2 Following all these tests, fullerene C60
was
registered as an antioxidant and skin-conditioning agent in the US in 2004 and acquired the INCI name Fullerenes. (The plural was used because fullerenes are a complex.) Japan followed suit the same year and it has since been registered in China, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia and India have registered fullerenes in INCI of each country. Many cosmetics containing fullerenes are already on sale.
Antioxidant & anti-ageing effects Fullerenes have great potential as skin antioxidants and anti-ageing agents that exert a stable antioxidant effect with an extremely long life compared to other antioxidants such as ascorbic acid. Several reactive oxygen species (ROS), such as hydroperoxides and hydrogen peroxide, produced in the nuclei of UVB- irradiated human skin keratinocytes (HaCaT), are suppressed by fullerenes encapsulated in polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP/fullerenes). PVP/fullerenes, a water-dispersion type
Figure 2: Fullerenes suppress inflammatory cytokines (COX2) Note: ROS generated by UV rays cause erythema on the skin by relaying multiple inflammatory cytokines cascade (A). COX-2 is a typical
inflammatory cytokine. COX-2 mRNA expression in laser-irradiated skin was significantly higher than in non-irradiated skin. However, fullerene treatment suppressed COX-2 mRNA expression and. as a result, suppressed laser erythema development (B)
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of fullerene cosmetic ingredient, is a radical scavenger or antioxidant in biological systems. It has prevented various forms of toxicity induced by UVA, probably by exerting a cytoprotective
February 2022 PERSONAL CARE
Fullerene C70
Ratio of COX-2 to GAPDH3 mRNA expression
Normal Laser Laser+ PVP/Fullerene
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