Melanin for a tanned skin

Melanin för en solbränd hud celloptimum

Melanin for a tanned skin

Melanin gives the skin its tanned look, and contributes to a deeper tan. In addition to making the skin tan, melanin also protects the skin from the sun's harmful UV rays! Simplified: the more melanin there is in the skin, the tanner we become and we also get a higher protection against UV rays; UV rays that can cause skin cancer and that our collagen in the skin breaks down.

How to get a tan fast?

Get a tan quickly and safely by using a food supplement that contains natural melanin. Melanin contributes to a deeper tan, which lasts longer.

Does melanin protect the skin from UV rays?

The outer layer of the skin has cells that contain the pigment melanin. Melanin protects the skin from the sun's ultraviolet rays. These can burn the skin and reduce its elasticity, leading to premature aging of the skin. The skin turns brown because sunlight causes the skin to produce more melanin and darken.

What is melanin?

Melanin is a complex polymer derived from the amino acid tyrosine. Melanin is found in human and animal skin in varying degrees, and is responsible for your unique eye, hair and skin color.

What does melanin do?

Melanin gives pigmentation to your skin, eyes and hair. The substance also absorbs harmful UV (ultraviolet) rays and protects your cells from sun damage.

Where is melanin produced?

Melanin is produced in melanocytes. These cells are found in various parts of your body, including:

  • Your hair.
  • The innermost layer of your skin.
  • Your pupils and iris.

How does melanin protect the skin?

​When you spend time out in the sun, your body produces more melanin. The substance absorbs light from UV rays and redistributes it towards the upper skin layers. It also protects the genetic material stored in your cells by keeping out harmful UV rays.

But remember that melanin alone is not enough to protect your skin from sun damage. That's why it's so important to wear sunscreen and appropriate clothing when you're outside.

What are the benefits of melanin?

Melanin protects against UV rays. Melanin protects your skin by absorbing harmful rays, including UVA, UVB, UVC and blue light.

How to increase melanin in the body?

Melanin is a pigment that protects against the sun's dangerous rays. People with dark skin have a higher amount of melanin in their skin and lighter people have a lower amount. Dietary supplements with melanin make you tan faster.

Can you build up your pigment?

By staying in the sun and exposing the skin to the sun's rays, the skin's pigment builds up and you become tanner. If you want to get tan faster without burning yourself, you can take a food supplement with the pigment melanin.

Which tablets are best for getting a tan?

A food supplement that contains a high content of natural melanin, keratin and copper. Copper contributes to normal skin pigmentation.

What should you eat to get a tan?

With a high enough intake of beta-carotene in the diet, it can look as if you have spent several days in the sun. You can find beta-carotene in colorful fruits, vegetables and plants. Carrots and sweet potatoes are examples of foods that contain beta-carotene. The downside of a dietary supplement containing beta-carotene, or eating a high intake of foods with beta-carotene, is that your skin will turn orange. Food supplements with melanin, on the other hand, give the skin an even and nice golden brown color.

Which vitamins make you tan?

Vitamin D is formed in the skin when we are out in the sun in summer, but this vitamin does not make you tan . It helps the body assimilate important substances such as phosphorus and calcium. It is also possible to get vitamin D through food or through dietary supplements. How long a person needs to be in the sun for vitamin D to form depends on skin pigmentation. The skin's pigment cells melanocytes produce melanin when we stay in the sun as a defense mechanism to protect the skin and the effect is that the skin turns brown.

How to get browner pigment?

By staying in the sun, you get browner pigments. If you take a dietary supplement with beta-carotene, the skin will, on the other hand, become more orange. If you get a high intake of beta-carotene through the diet, the beta-carotene will be stored in the subcutaneous fat and thus help the body create a pigment change, which becomes more orange.

How do you get a tan if you have poor pigmentation?

By taking a food supplement with melanin, you will tan faster and get a deeper tan.

Is it melanin that makes the skin golden brown?

When the skin is exposed to the sun, melanin production increases, which is what gives the skin its golden brown color. It is the body's natural defense mechanism to prevent the skin from being burned by the sun. In other words; melanin absorbs harmful UV rays (ultraviolet) and protects your cells from sun damage.

When you are out in the sun, your body produces more melanin. Melanin absorbs light from the UV rays and redistributes this in the upper skin layer. It also protects the genetic material stored in your cells by keeping out harmful UV rays.

But remember that melanin alone is not enough to protect your skin from sun damage. That's why it's so important to wear sunscreen and appropriate clothing when you're out in the sun.

Did you also know that melanin gives pigmentation to your eyes and to your hair!

Why does the skin get tanned?

Tanning is actually a pigment change in the skin when it is exposed to ultraviolet radiation (UV). When the skin gets sunburned, the skin forms pigment (melanin) that absorbs more of the UV radiation and protects the skin. It is this pigment - melanin - that causes the skin to turn brown!

When you are in the sun, the skin tries to protect itself against the UV rays. Even if it's cloudy outside, the UV rays pass through the clouds and reach your skin.

It is important to protect your skin from sun damage caused by UV radiation. Natural components of the skin, such as melanin, can help the skin protect itself from the inside out!

What is melanin?

Melanin is a pigment in the skin that protects you from the sun's dangerous rays. Melanin can absorb the sun's harmful rays and thus protect the skin. People with dark skin naturally have a higher amount of melanin in their skin than those with lighter skin.

Melanin production in the skin can increase over time, which means that you get better protection against the harmful UV rays.

Can a dietary supplement with melanin protect the skin and make it tan?

Melanin gives the skin its tanned look, while the amount of melanin increases with sunburn. In addition to making the skin tan, melanin also protects the skin from the sun's harmful UV rays! Simplified; the more melanin there is in the skin, the tanner we become and we also get a higher protection against UV rays; UV rays that can cause skin cancer and that our collagen breaks down.

What are melanin and keratin?

In the epidermis (epidermis) there are three types of cells. The cells that occur most are keratinocytes (90%). Keratinocytes manufacture keratin. These cells take up melanin from melanocytes, which are located in the bottom layer of the epidermis. (Interspersed between the keratinocytes are Langerhans cells that are part of the adaptive immune system).

In more detail, it can be said that skin pigmentation reflects an interaction between two cell types within an epidermal-melanin unit. Melanocytes in the basal layer of the epidermis synthesize melanin pigment in specialized membrane-bound compartments called melanosomes. The melanins in the melanosomes polymerize on an amyloid matrix to form a melanin core. Subsequently, melanin pigment is transferred from melanocyte dendrites to closely approximated keratinocytes in the basal epidermal layer. Keratinocytes store melanin in membrane-bound compartments and place them in a "helmet" that surrounds the nucleus to protect their DNA from UV radiation.

Melanin is a polymer that is made up of a chain of molecular parts, monomers. Melanocytes produce mainly two types of pigment: pheomelanin (red) and eumelanin (dark brown)

  • Pheomelanin is a human melanin, which is found in smaller amounts in skin and hair. Light-skinned people have more pheomelanin than dark-skinned people. Pheomelanin contains the amino acid cysteine ​​which gives red/yellow color tones, and pheoalanine is very abundant in large quantities in red hair and also contributes to the reddish color of freckles.
  • Eumelanin is the most common melanin in human skin and hair, and dark-skinned people have more eumelanin. Eumelanin colors hair from brown to black, and eumelanin is also the form of melanin that is usually missing in albinism.

Melanin is found in addition to the skin, also in the hair, in the retina, in the medulla of the kidney and in the zona reticularis of the adrenal gland, in the inner ear, and in some places in the brain.

What causes melanin in the skin to increase?

When the skin is exposed to the sun's UVB radiation, it gradually forms a pigment - melanin - which protects against mainly UVB radiation, and causes the skin to tan. This production of melanin is called melanogenesis. The increased production of melanin is a reaction to the DNA damage caused by UV radiation. Melanogenesis leads to delayed tanning, which typically becomes visible two or three days after exposure.

UVA radiation does not cause sunburn, but reaches deeper into the skin and can break down the connective tissue protein collagen , which among other things accelerates skin aging, and makes the skin wrinkled and inelastic. If you have read our previous articles on collagen, you understand how important it is to protect this protein - for both your health and beauty! The UVA radiation causes the melanin formed from the UVB radiation to darken. UVA radiation can also release melanin from the melanocytes, but does not increase the amount of melanin in the body, as UVB radiation does.

The tan created by increased melanogenesis typically lasts a few weeks or months, much longer than the tan created by oxidation of previous melanin (what happens when the skin is exposed to UVA radiation), and is thus an effective protection against radiation damage from UV- radiation, and not just cosmetic.

Tanning through exposure to UVA radiation therefore does not lead to increased protection against sun damage. In order to get a true "melanogenesis tan" through UV radiation, the skin must first be exposed to some direct DNA damage. This requires UVB exposure.

Is it genetic that some people tan more easily?

Answer: YES! Some people have an easier time turning brown, which depends on the genes that cause melanin to be produced. In contrast, all people have roughly the same concentration of melanocytes in their skin, but the melanocytes of darker-skinned people express more of certain genes that cause melanin to be produced.

More specifically, melanin formation is a product of complex biochemical events starting from the amino acid tyrosine and its metabolite, dopa. The types and amounts of melanin produced by melanocytes are genetically determined and influenced by a range of factors, such as hormonal changes, inflammation, age and exposure to UV light. These stimuli affect the different pathways in melanogenesis.

What to eat to increase melanin production? What should you eat to get tanned more easily?

To increase melanin production in the skin, you can help the body a little along the way to increase the amount of this protective pigment. Nutrients may be the key to increasing melanin naturally in the skin. Here are some nutrients that can help your body produce more melanin.

COPPER

Copper helps the body produce melanin, and likewise elastin which is another important component of the skin. Copper is needed in small amounts, but is such an important nutrient for our bodies. Copper is found in, among other things, oysters, liver and shellfish. Other foods that contain copper are plums, whole grains, dark leafy vegetables, potatoes and nuts.

TYROSINE

Tyrosine is an amino acid that is needed for the production of melanin. Amino acids are the building blocks of protein, so you can find tyrosine in both plant and animal foods. Soy products, eggs, fish, cheese and turkey are all good sources of the amino acid tyrosine.

The speed of melanogenesis is controlled by the enzyme tyrosinase, which determines how active the cells are in forming melanin. The melanin is formed, as previously mentioned, by melanocytes in melanosomes, which are found, among other things, in the skin and in the hair roots.

ANTIOXIDANTS

Antioxidants show the strongest potential for increasing melanin production. Micronutrients such as flavonoids or polyphenols, which come from the plants we eat, act as powerful antioxidants and can affect melanin production. Some of them increase melanin, while others can help reduce it. Eat more antioxidant-rich foods such as dark leafy greens, dark berries and colorful vegetables to get more antioxidants.

Do you want to get a tan without burning yourself or staying too long in the sun?

According to studies, you can get "a tanned look" just by eating vegetables. The color that contributes to the tanned look comes from carotenoids found in vegetables.

Many carotenoids are red, orange or yellow. These are found in large quantities in vegetables such as carrots and tomatoes and to a lesser extent in fruits such as apricots and mangoes. Because these pigments are fat-soluble, some accumulate under the skin and change skin color.

Carotenoids tend to yellow the skin. The color change from the tan, on the other hand, comes from an increase in the skin's melanin. Melanin makes the skin browner.

What is the best sunscreen?

Sunscreens in various forms are used more and more to protect against the sun's ultraviolet radiation, and are "the basics" when it comes to avoiding wrinkles and skin cancer. When the sun's rays reach the earth, it contains both UVA and UVB rays. It is mainly the UVB rays that cause sunburned skin, while the UVA rays, which have a longer wavelength, penetrate deeper into the skin and, among other things, contributes to premature aging of the skin. The sunscreens we use therefore need to protect against both UVA and UVB radiation. In 2006, the EU Commission produced a recommendation to clarify the requirements placed on sun protection products. One of the requirements was, among other things, that they must protect against all kinds of solar radiation, both UVA and UVB.

Can you get sunburned through a window pane?

The answer is generally no. Sunburn is caused by UV radiation that lies between visible light and X-ray radiation.

UV radiation is divided into three variants:

  • UVA – wavelength between 315–400 nanometers, is the least energetic part of UV radiation. At the same time, it is the one that has the easiest time penetrating different materials. This radiation also reaches a little further down into our skin, and breaks down the beauty protein collagen . As also mentioned above, it is the UVA rays that cause the pigment melanin to darken, so that we get a beautiful tan. But it is not the UVA rays, but the UVB rays that stimulate the skin to form new melanin.

  • UVB – wavelength between 280–315 nanometers, relatively high in energy. It is this radiation that causes us to burn if we sunbathe too much. The UVB radiation is partially filtered out by the ozone layer in the atmosphere, so that only part of the UVB radiation reaches the earth's surface.
  • UVC – wavelength shorter than 280 nanometers, which is extremely strong. But this does not reach the earth's surface because it is absorbed by the atmosphere (not only by the ozone layer, but by the entire atmosphere).

Ordinary window glass lets most of the UVA rays through, but almost no UVB rays. The melanin we already have in our skin can therefore darken if we sunbathe through a window pane, but then the process stops.

SOME QUICK ABOUT UV RADIATION

  • There are three types of UV radiation: UVA, B and C
  • Cancer, sun damage is likely a result of UVB radiation
  • Wrinkles are mostly a result of UVA radiation. The UVA rays won't burn you through a window, but will age your skin - which is because glass absorbs all the UVB rays, but not all the UVA rays. The UVA rays break down the skin's collagen
  • You can get sunburned on a cloudy day because the UVB rays can penetrate the clouds