Skin and Skin Care A tetrapeptide for antiaging: Benoit reviews a commercial product that is a synthetic tetrapeptide with a unique antiaging action that targets the metabolism of a specific proteoglycan—lumican—to enhance the skin’s strength and firmness.1
Consumers of different ages increasingly expect cosmetic products to prevent and reduce the signs of aging, and to keep their skin firm, supple and elastic. As a result, manufacturers are constantly searching for effective cosmetic ingredients with scientifically proven mechanisms of action and demonstrable benefits. Boosting collagen synthesis has been recognized as a key approach in antiaging for some time. Now in-depth research into the subject of skin aging has revealed that the way the collagen fibrils are organized is just as important in keeping skin youthful as the total number of those fibrils.
A study conducted by Laboratoires Sérobiologiques (LS) has highlighted the crucial role that small protein-sugar complexes called proteoglycans play in organizing collagen fibers, and consequently in maintaining the integrity of the extracellular matrix (ECM). One of those proteoglycans is lumican, which is involved in the organization of collagen fibrils into functional fibers. In a fundamental research study, LS has shown that the amount of lumican decreases with age, resulting in a loss of organization of the collagen fibers.
