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Benton Fermentation maskIngredients explained
A famous water-like, yeast-derived ingredient that the whole SKII brand is built on. As legend has it, SKII scientists in the 1970's discovered by chance that aged Japanese sake brewers have amazingly soft and youthful hands in contrast to their aged and wrinkled faces. They concluded that the secret must lie in the yeast that the brewers’ hands were in constant contact with during the sake fermentation process.
So Pitera - obtained by a fermentation process of a certain yeast belonging to the genus Galactomyces - was discovered as an anti-aging, skin-nourishing magic liquid. The company claims that the clear, water-like liquid is loaded with good-for-the-skin stuff and is rich in vitamins, amino acids, minerals and organic acids.
As for the science behind Pitera, SKII parent company P&G did an in-vitro (made in the lab) study that confirmed that Pitera-containing moisturizers do indeed help to protect the skin against damage. More specifically, they found that Pitera has antioxidant effects and increases hyaluronan production in epidermal cells. And more hyaluronic acid in the skin means better hydrated, plumper, healthier skin.
If that would not be enough, there is also a 2014 study showing that Pitera might be able to help with skin pigmentation and a 2015 study finding that Galactomyces Ferment Filtrate can activate aryl hydrocarbon receptor (AhR) that's important in epidermal homeostasis by upregulating epidermal barrier proteins. English translation equals: Pitera might be able to help with a healthy skin barrier.
All in all, both anecdotal and scientific evidence show that Pitera is a skin goodie so if you are into essences and yeast-derived fermentations, it's definitely worth a try.
Good old water, aka H2O. The most common skincare ingredient of all. You can usually find it right in the very first spot of the ingredient list, meaning it’s the biggest thing out of all the stuff that makes up the product.
It’s mainly a solvent for ingredients that do not like to dissolve in oils but rather in water.
Once inside the skin, it hydrates, but not from the outside - putting pure water on the skin (hello long baths!) is drying.
One more thing: the water used in cosmetics is purified and deionized (it means that almost all of the mineral ions inside it is removed). Like this, the products can stay more stable over time.
We don't have description for this ingredient yet.
- A natural moisturizer that’s also in our skin
- A super common, safe, effective and cheap molecule used for more than 50 years
- Not only a simple moisturizer but knows much more: keeps the skin lipids between our skin cells in a healthy (liquid crystal) state, protects against irritation, helps to restore barrier
- Effective from as low as 3% with even more benefits for dry skin at higher concentrations up to 20-40%
- High-glycerin moisturizers are awesome for treating severely dry skin
Propanediol is a natural alternative for the often used and often bad-mouthed propylene glycol. It's produced sustainably from corn sugar and it's Ecocert approved.
It's quite a multi-tasker: can be used to improve skin moisturization, as a solvent, to boost preservative efficacy or to influence the sensory properties of the end formula.
A multi-functional, silky feeling helper ingredient that can do quite many things. It's used as an emulsion stabilizer, solvent and a broad spectrum antimicrobial. According to manufacturer info, it's also a moisturizer and helps to make the product feel great on the skin. It works synergistically with preservatives and helps to improve water-resistance of sunscreens.
Butylene glycol, or let’s just call it BG, is a multi-tasking colorless, syrupy liquid. It’s a great pick for creating a nice feeling product.
BG’s main job is usually to be a solvent for the other ingredients. Other tasks include helping the product to absorb faster and deeper into the skin (penetration enhancer), making the product spread nicely over the skin (slip agent), and attracting water (humectant) into the skin.
It’s an ingredient whose safety hasn’t been questioned so far by anyone (at least not that we know about). BG is approved by Ecocert and is also used enthusiastically in natural products. BTW, it’s also a food additive.
Bifida Ferment Lysate is a probiotic ingredient that’s used in one of the most iconic serums in the world, the Estee Lauder Advanced Night Repair. Based on manufacturer info it potently protects against UV-induced damage in the skin and helps with DNA repair. An Estee Lauder patent from 2009 also talks about DNA repair activity.
As far as published research goes we could find one promising one. It showed that applying 10% bacterial extract to sensitive, reactive skin helped with better barrier function and decreased skin sensitivity.
Overall, it is definitely a promising ingredient, even for sensitive skin types but not the most proven one (yet).
A really multi-functional helper ingredient that can do several things in a skincare product: it can bring a soft and pleasant feel to the formula, it can act as a humectant and emollient, it can be a solvent for some other ingredients (for example it can help to stabilize perfumes in watery products) and it can also help to disperse pigments more evenly in makeup products. And that is still not all: it can also boost the antimicrobial activity of preservatives.
It’s the - sodium form - cousin of the famous NMF, hyaluronic acid (HA). If HA does not tell you anything we have a super detailed, geeky explanation about it here. The TL; DR version of HA is that it's a huge polymer (big molecule from repeated subunits) found in the skin that acts as a sponge helping the skin to hold onto water, being plump and elastic. HA is famous for its crazy water holding capacity as it can bind up to 1000 times its own weight in water.
As far as skincare goes, sodium hyaluronate and hyaluronic acid are pretty much the same and the two names are used interchangeably. As cosmetic chemist kindofstephen writes on reddit "sodium hyaluronate disassociates into hyaluronic acid molecule and a sodium atom in solution".
In spite of this, if you search for "hyaluronic acid vs sodium hyaluronate" you will find on multiple places that sodium hyaluronate is smaller and can penetrate the skin better. Chemically, this is definitely not true, as the two forms are almost the same, both are polymers and the subunits can be repeated in both forms as much as you like. (We also checked Prospector for sodium hyaluronate versions actually used in cosmetic products and found that the most common molecular weight was 1.5-1.8 million Da that absolutely counts as high molecular weight).
What seems to be a true difference, though, is that the salt form is more stable, easier to formulate and cheaper so it pops up more often on the ingredient lists.
If you wanna become a real HA-and-the-skin expert you can read way more about the topic at hyaluronic acid (including penetration-questions, differences between high and low molecular weight versions and a bunch of references to scientific literature).
One of the many types of ceramides that can be found naturally in the upper layer of the skin. Ceramides make up about 50% of the goopy stuff that's between our skin cells and play a super important role in having a healthy skin barrier and keeping the skin hydrated. It works even better when combined with its pal, Ceramide 1.
We wrote way more about ceramides at ceramide 1, so click here to know more.
The extract coming from the juice containing leaves of the Aloe vera plant. It's usually a hydroglycolic extract (though oil extract for the lipid parts also exists) that has similar moisturizing, emollient and anti-inflammatory properties as the juice itself. We have written some more about aloe here.
We don't have description for this ingredient yet.
If you see a cosmetic product that claims that it has "Botox-like effect" then two things are almost certain: one, the product overpromises and two, it contains Argireline.
So this one is the famous peptide that's marketed by its manufacturer as the "Botox in a jar". The basis for this claim is that it targets the same wrinkle forming mechanism (wrinkles caused by facial muscle movement) as Botox, but the way it works is very different. In addition, the extent to which it can prevent muscles from contracting (and to smooth wrinkles) is very different (otherwise why would anyone use still Botox?).
The manufacturer did several studies to prove that Argireline really works and it does (just not as well as Botox). In-vivo (made on real people) tests showed that using 10% Argireline solution around the eyes for 15 days decreased wrinkles depth by 17%, while a 5% Argireline formula applied for 28 days did almost the same with a decrease in wrinkle depth by 16.26%. A Spanish University also did some research and found that Argireline increased the level of skin moisturization and decreased both the depth and width of wrinkles "significantly".
This means, Acetyl Hexapeptide-8 does have some ability to smooth wrinkles (but not as well as Botox - sorry, if we sound like a broken record). Also, we have to agree with TruthInAging, that it's not a collagen builder and not a preventer of structural aging (think vitamin C, AHAs or retinol); it's just a quick fix. If you are looking for one, this could be your thing. If you are more of a "let's treat this aging thing properly" type, then it's probably not your thing.
- GHK-Cu is a copper-peptide complex found naturally in yucky bodily fluids (plasma, saliva, and urine)
- It has unique wound healing properties by stimulating the breakdown of unhealthy, too large collagen in scar tissue and stimulating nice and healthy collagen production afterwards
- It stimulates the production of several important skin-identical ingredients (e.g. collagen, elastin, and glycosaminoglycans)
- It has significant anti-inflammatory and antioxidant effect
- There are a few promising studies showing GHK-Cu can improve skin elasticity, clarity, firmness and reduce lines and wrinkles
- It can improve hair growth by enlarging hair follicles (and bigger follicles produce longer, thicker hair)
- There are some urban legends about possible overdosing or facial hair problems (read more in geeky details)
A sugar beet-derived amino acid derivative with nice skin protection and moisturization properties. Betaine's special thing is being an osmolyte, a molecule that helps to control cell-water balance. It is also a natural osmoprotectant, meaning that it attracts water away from the protein surface and thus protects them from denaturation and increases their thermodynamic stability.
It also gives sensorial benefits to the formula and when used in cleansers, it helps to make them milder and gentler.
An easy-to-formulate, commonly used, nice to have ingredient that’s also called pro-vitamin B5. As you might guess from the “pro” part, it’s a precursor to vitamin B5 (whose fancy name is pantothenic acid).
Its main job in skincare products is to moisturise the skin. It’s a humectant meaning that it can help the skin to attract water and then hold onto it. There is also research showing that panthenol can help our skin to produce more lovely lipids that are important for a strong and healthy skin barrier.
Another great thing about panthenol is that it has anti-inflammatory and skin protecting abilities. A study shows that it can reduce the irritation caused by less-nice other ingredients (e.g. fragrance, preservatives or chemical sunscreens) in the product.
Research also shows that it might be useful for wound healing as it promotes fibroblast (nice type of cells in our skin that produce skin-firming collagen) proliferation.
If that wasn’t enough panthenol is also useful in nail and hair care products. A study shows that a nail treatment liquide with 2% panthenol could effectively get into the nail and significantly increase the hydration of it.
As for the hair the hydration effect is also true there. Panthenol might make your hair softer, more elastic and helps to comb your hair more easily.
The extract coming from the alpine lichen, Usnea Barbata. It is known for its excellent efficacy against gram-positive bacteria, meaning that it can serve as a natural preservative and deodorant agent.
Its main biologically active component is usnic acid (a molecule produced only by lichens) that's not only an antibacterial agent, but also has antioxidant, anti-inflammatory and wound-healing promoting effects. According to manufacturer info, the antibacterial activity of Usnea Barbata makes the ingredient helpful against body odor, blemished skin, and dandruff.
It is also very common in K-Beauty products, as it is part of a popular Korean natural preservative system trade named EURO-Napre (combined with Zanthoxylum Piperitum and Pulsatilla Koreana).
If you are into Japanese cuisine, you might know this guy as Japanese pepper or Sanshō pepper that is known for its unique fresh aroma and appetite increasing spicy sensation.
As for the skin benefits of Zanthoxylum Piperitum, it might have antioxidant effects (with active components called hyperoside and quercitrin), but more importantly, it is an antibacterial and natural preservative agent. It is pretty common in K-Beauty products, as it's one of the three natural extracts that make up the popular Korean preservative called EURO-NApre.
Combined with Usnea Barbata and Pulsatilla Koreana, these three extracts are claimed to form a natural preservative system that also has anti-inflammatory effects and might help with skin conditions such as blemishes, atopic dermatitis, and dandruff.
On the flip side, Zanthoxylum Piperitum contains fragrant components (Limonene and Citrone), that might irritate sensitive skin.
The extract of Korean Pasque Flower that is mostly used for its antimicrobial and natural preservative activities. It usually comes to the formula combined with Zanthoxylum Piperitum and Usnea Barbata, as the three extracts make up a popular Korean natural preservative system trade named EURO-NApre.
The plant extract is also a traditional oriental herbal medicine that is known for its analgesic, anti-inflammatory, and astringent effects.
A nice little helper ingredient that can thicken up cosmetic products and create beautiful gel formulas. It's derived from cellulose, the major component of the cell wall of green plants. It is compatible with most co-ingredients and gives a very good slip to the formulas.
Adenosine is an important little compound in our body that has a vital cell-signalling role. Research on smearing it on our face is also promising and shows so far a couple of things:
- It can help with wound healing
- It’s a good anti-inflammatory agent
- It might even help with skin’s own collagen production and improve skin firmness and elasticity
- It helps with barrier repair and protection
- It might be even useful for the hair helping with hair thickness and hair growth
A big molecule created from repeated subunits (a polymer of acrylic acid) that magically converts a liquid into a nice gel formula. It usually has to be neutralized with a base (such as sodium hydroxide) for the thickening to occur and it creates viscous, clear gels that also feel nice and non-tacky on the skin. No wonder, it is a very popular and common ingredient. Typically used at 1% or less in most formulations.
It's the chemically chopped up version of normal lecithin. Most often it's used to create liposomes and to coat and stabilize other ingredients.
A semi-essential (infants cannot synthesize it, but adults can) amino acid that is one of the primary building blocks of hair keratin and skin collagen. It's a natural moisturizing factor, a skin hydrator and might also help to speed up wound healing.
Arginine usually has a positive charge (cationic) that makes it substantive to skin and hair (those are more negatively charged surfaces) and an excellent film former. Thanks to the positive charge, it also creates a complex with AHAs (AHAs like to lose a hydrogen ion and be negatively charged, so the positive and the negative ions attract each other) that causes a "time-release AHA effect" and reduces the irritation associated with AHAs.
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| what‑it‑does | moisturizer/humectant |
| what‑it‑does | solvent |
| what‑it‑does | moisturizer/humectant |
| what‑it‑does | skin-identical ingredient | moisturizer/humectant |
| irritancy, com. | 0, 0 |
| what‑it‑does | solvent | moisturizer/humectant |
| what‑it‑does | solvent | moisturizer/humectant |
| what‑it‑does | moisturizer/humectant | solvent |
| irritancy, com. | 0, 1 |
| what‑it‑does | solvent |
| what‑it‑does | skin-identical ingredient | moisturizer/humectant |
| irritancy, com. | 0, 0 |
| what‑it‑does | skin-identical ingredient |
| what‑it‑does | soothing | emollient | moisturizer/humectant |
| what‑it‑does | moisturizer/humectant |
| what‑it‑does | cell-communicating ingredient | moisturizer/humectant |
| what‑it‑does | cell-communicating ingredient | soothing | antioxidant |
| what‑it‑does | moisturizer/humectant |
| what‑it‑does | soothing | moisturizer/humectant |
| irritancy, com. | 0, 0 |
| what‑it‑does | preservative | antimicrobial/antibacterial |
| what‑it‑does | antioxidant | antimicrobial/antibacterial | preservative |
| what‑it‑does | antimicrobial/antibacterial | preservative |
| what‑it‑does | viscosity controlling |
| what‑it‑does | cell-communicating ingredient |
| what‑it‑does | viscosity controlling |
| irritancy, com. | 0, 1 |
| what‑it‑does | emollient | emulsifying |
| what‑it‑does | skin-identical ingredient |