Antiaging ingredients: Vitamin C

Antiaging ingredients are hot in skin care right now and there are many to be found. Lets go over vitamin C now.

Vitamin C, also called ascorbic acid, is essential for healthy skin and necessary for the synthesis of collagen in the skin. Collagen is a fibrous protein that not only makes up a good portion of the dermis of the skin but also the bones. Scurvy, a rare disease now, occurs with vitamin C deficiencies. Because vitamin C is part of the skin's dermis a deficiency can also show up as increased bruising.

Ascorbic acid is a cofactor for the enzyme prolyl hydroxylase and lysyl hydroxylase. These enzymes are used to add a hydroxyl group (OH) to the amino acids proline and lysine which are found in collagen in high amounts. Once hydroxylated, these amino acids in collagen function to stabilize the three dimensional structure of collagen by cross linking its peptide strands. This is needed to form its fibril structure which is very strong and so gives tissues their strength.

Most plants and animals are able to make their own vitamin C from glucose but not humans. So ingestion of vitamin C is of utmost importance, but topical use is also good. The trouble is that ascorbic acid is not very stable; upon exposure to air it oxidizes rapidly to become not only ineffective but also potentially dangerous. Because of this there have been attempts to alter the molecule somewhat to make it more stable for cosmetic use. Some of these vitamin C derivatives include:

1. Ascorbyl palmitate. This is also referred to as vitamin C ester as it is an ester formed from ascorbic acid and the fatty acid palmitate. This also makes it fat soluble - a useful thing for many cosmetic formulations.

2. Magnesium ascorbyl phosphate and sodium ascorbyl phosphate. These are both water soluble forms of ascorbic acid that are very similar to vitamin C.

Besides using vitamin C to boost collagen production in skin, several synthetic peptides have recently come to market that have the ability to affect transcription of the collagen gene and stimulate collagen production. But we'll talk about those another time.

Foods and herbs high in vitamin C include of course citrus, but also rosehips, parsley, strawberry and elderberry. Any of these could be used to do a fresh facial for the skin. But if you formulate a cosmetic product you will want to use one of the more stable forms of vitamin C. A fruit mask is also good because of the alpha hydroxy acid content and this is the time of year to enjoy masks.

Strawberry Yogurt Face Mask
2-4 tablespoons full fat yogurt
2-3 fresh strawberries
Mash together or put in a small blender until pureed. Apply to face and relax for 5-10 minutes then wash off. Your face should feel great afterward.

ChokeCherry Find

My husband came home from work with a bagful of chokecherries he picked so we had to figure out something to do with them. The most obvious use of chokecherry is as a syrup to be used in the winter for coughs (as well as being delicious on ice cream, pancakes, drinks or anywhere else you would use a syrup). Typically choke cherries are very bitter and astringent in taste, but these are actually very sweet; possibly because they were growing by a stream and getting more water. Chokecherries are very high in ellagic acid. Since I have been reading lately of the benefits of ellagic acid in skin care I wanted to find some use for these fruits for skin, perhaps a face mask.

Face Mask

Mix

3 tablespoons chokecherry juice

1 tablespoon bentonite clay

2 teaspoons avocado oil

Mix to a nice consistency and smear on your face. Now enjoy a cup of tea while the mask sets on your face. After 10 minutes or so use a wet washcloth to wipe the mask off your face.

Chokecherry Juice

To make a juice put chokecherries in a saucepan to fill about 2/3 full. Fill with water almost to the level of the top of the cherries. Bring water to a gentle boil for 30 minutes or so. Put cherries through some type of press such as used to make jam. I use a device used to make applesauce. Allow juice to drain into a separate bowl while skins and seeds remain behind.

Chokecherry Syrup

For chokecherry syrup I mixed 3 cups of juice with about 3 cups of sugar and simmered that for about 30 minutes. This produced a very thick syrup that would work great for pancakes. For a cough syrup I will use 3 cups of juice with 1 1/2 sugar and also add a few tablespoons of vodka to that as well. The lower amount of sugar might not be enough of a preservative. You could also freeze this until you want to use it.

The seeds however contain poisonous glycosides (hydrocyanic acid) and should not be eaten by humans or animals; unless cooked or dried first.

Chokecherries are native to much of the US and were used extensively by Native Americans for a number of health complaints. These include as a poultice to stop bleeding and to treat skin sores and burns, as a tea or infusion for stomach cramps, fever, diarrhea and dysentery. Both the fruit and the bark are used medicinally. The cherries also a a good food source for both humans and animals. Chokecherry jam and pies are quite common and chokecherries were an important ingredient of the pemmican made by many Native Americans as a dried food for winter.

The purple color of the cherries is said to make a good purple-red dye. This is something I might save some berries for to try dying some mohair. Last summer I planted quite a few chokecherry bushes so by next summer I may be loaded with cherries.

Here is a good write up on chokecherries for more information.

http://plants.usda.gov/plantguide/doc/cs_prvi.doc