If you had told me five years ago that the next big breakthrough in anti-aging was searing off the surface layer of your skin with acid… I’d probably have laughed.
What will those crazies come up with next?
But this is 2017, and the industry of acidic skin serums is now a multi-million dollar industry filled with cosmetics industry giants and the wealthiest names in Hollywood. If you want to know the secret to all those eternally youthful A-listers, the answer is increasingly: Acid.
Acid makes your skin more beautiful? What?
“Skin serum”, as it’s called in the industry is a category of anti-aging treatment which is soaring in popularity. Why? Because it’s easy, relatively inexpensive (as beauty treatments go) and can be done at home.
Perhaps more amazingly, it works.
The science keeps coming in, and the results do too. Unlike some beauty treatments that take thousands of dollars and multiple trips to high-end clinics, using skin serum is usually an under $100 proposition. (Although there are high end brands which promise even more tantalizing results).
So what is skin serum?
While there are several different varieties, the most common is undoubtedly based on ascorbic acid. And while that might sound like nothing you’d ever want to put on your face, it’s more common name is: Vitamin C.
While applying skin serum may be simple, the science behind it is surprisingly complex.
But since this isn’t a publication for a “science crowd”, I’ll put it like this: The skin cells on the surface of your skin are the oldest skin cells on your body. The plump, shiny new ones are hiding just underneath. And they look much, much better.
By removing that top layer of your skin you reveal the much younger looking layer underneath.
But that’s not all. You’ll also in the process, dissolve many of the fine lines and wrinkles before they become big creases. Keep zapping those fine lines and well… you keep the big wrinkles from showing up.
So it’s just cosmetic… You’re not really making your skin younger, right?
Actually…
If it were just a matter of “hiding wrinkles” skin serum would be a nice, cosmetic product.
But that’s where the science gets a whole lot cooler: As you probably know, the difference between full-looking, youthful skin and old, saggy skin is collagen. Collagen is that awesome stuff that binds your cells together and gives your skin a firm, toned look. As we get older, the collagen thins out and we see the visual effects of sagging, wrinkles and a feeling of “slackness” to the skin.
For years, doctors have been trying to figure out how to get that collagen back. Today there are collagen pills, collagen soft drinks, collagen soaps and collagen creams. Unfortunately — you can’t get more collagen from eating it. And you also can’t absorb usable collagen out of a cream or a soap.
There’s only one way to get more of your own collagen into your skin: You have to grow it yourself.
And this is where skin serums really start to work their magic.
As ascorbic acid absorbs into your skin, it damages your skin on a microscopic level. It’s doing, to a lesser extent, the same thing to the subsurface layers of your skin that it’s doing to the surface of your skin. Except down below, the process is more remarkable.
When your skin loses a skin cell here and there, your body sounds an alarm that tells your body to hurry up and make more skin cells. That accelerated growth process results in a slow but steady increase in the amount of collagen in the skin.
So the effects of skin serum aren’t just on the surface.
Your skin is actually getting more collagen-rich on the lower levels as well.
And that, is the science that so many stars are using to look eternally 35. It’s not magic, but it sure looks like it.
