With the increasing demand for natural, green and safe cosmetics, the development of cosmetics is paying more and more attention to extracts and active ingredients from natural sources. These natural ingredients add functionality to the cosmetic itself.
1. Toning
Cosmetics are mostly tinted with colorants. Most synthetic colorings contain heavy metals such as lead and mercury, which are harmful to the human body and are highly toxic. The high safety makes the natural pigments suitable for the crowd. And it's colorful. Water-soluble natural pigments, such as anthocyanins and betalains, are often found in cosmetics such as natural lipsticks and lip balms.
However, natural pigments have problems such as narrow chromaticity adjustment range and poor stability. It is used less frequently in cosmetics. They are used as additives in the food coloring and printing and dyeing industries. Therefore, how to further enrich the types and stability of natural pigments will be the key development direction of natural product colorants in the future.
2. Sunscreen and whitening
Ultraviolet light induces hyperpigmentation, leading to sunburn and photoaging of the skin. Melanin is the main cause of human skin pigmentation. The sunscreen effect of cosmetics relies on the absorption of ultraviolet rays by the active ingredients. The whitening effect is to improve skin tone by inhibiting the activity of tyrosinase and reducing the production of melanin.
Commonly used whitening traditional Chinese medicine cosmetic raw materials are skullcap, angelica, chuanxiong and safflower. There are also a variety of whitening skin care cosmetics containing salidroside ingredients on the market.
3. Anti-inflammatory and antibacterial
There are many Chinese herbal medicines with anti-inflammatory and antibacterial properties in Chinese pharmacopoeia, such as honeysuckle, coptis, and forsythia.
The anti-inflammatory and antibacterial activities of honeysuckle make it show unique application value in the field of cosmetics. The chemical composition of honeysuckle is complex, mainly including organic acids, flavonoids and terpenes. Modern research generally believes that the antibacterial active ingredient of honeysuckle is chlorogenic acid. And the quality of honeysuckle is often evaluated by the level of chlorogenic acid content. Chlorogenic acid mainly reduces the virulence factors of pathogenic bacteria by inhibiting the activity of bacterial proteases and through its metabolite quinic acid.
Coptis chinensis and Scutellaria baicalensis extracts have broad-spectrum antibacterial activity, which can strongly inhibit bacterial and fungal growth. The main ingredients of the Coptis eye patch on the market are Burnet extract, Scutellaria baicalensis extract and Coptis chinensis extract. It can relieve eye fatigue, remove dark circles, anti-inflammatory, antibacterial, skin conditioning and other effects. Among them, Coptis chinensis extract mainly plays the role of antibacterial and anti-inflammatory.