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Do plant powders work in skincare formulas?
As extracts don’t really have much of a role in skincare formulas, I was wondering if powders like neem powder, sandalwood powder etc. help in formulas? Asians have been using DIY beauty since forever (not things like putting raw lemons on your face but more like a mixture of fresh yogurt, honey, neem powder, papaya, etc) and this has really proven to work since decades. I recently learnt that extracts don’t do much in skincare formulas but what about powders?
Sorry if the question is dumb and thanks in advance! -
18 Replies
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It all depends on how much of what and the purpose of your product.Extracts are, if done properly, plant powders minus inactive material (such as cellulose and lignin) or, in other words, enriched active plant metabolites. From a pharmaceutical as well as a stability point of view, extracts are way better than plant powders though not always easier to work with.The issue with cosmetic formulations is that cosmetic extracts are not pharmaceutical ones. They contain often just small amounts of an extract dissolved in a large amount of solvent (water, glycerol etc.). The composition of said extracts is too often unknown or deliberately adjusted to be ineffective from a pharmacological point of view. In the former case, it is driven by $$, disinterest, and irrelevance whilst in the latter case is a legal prerequisite.I’ve been involved in a few collaborations with cosmetic industries during my postdoc in pharmacognosy & phytochemistry: The aim was to create scientific proof that the plant (not the sold extract) contains active ingredients aligning with intended marketing claims whilst the extract to be finally used had to be non-toxic and skin impermeable (else, it would have been a drug, not a cosmetic). I hated that kind of work but it’s been good $$ from which also our real research profited. This and the need to publish where money instead of need is killed my interest in further pursuing my academic career. -
Pharma said:I’ve been involved in a few collaborations with cosmetic industries during my postdoc in pharmacognosy & phytochemistry: The aim was to create scientific proof that the plant (not the sold extract) contains active ingredients aligning with intended marketing claims whilst the extract to be finally used had to be non-toxic and skin impermeable (else, it would have been a drug, not a cosmetic). I hated that kind of work but it’s been good $$ from which also our real research profited. This and the need to publish where money instead of need is killed my interest in further pursuing my academic career.So sad, but so true.
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Largely hype.
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“Asians have been using DIY beauty since forever…and this has really proven to work since decades.”
Just because people have been doing something forever doesn’t mean that it really works. The only thing it really means is that it isn’t noticeably harmful. Only by doing controlled studies can you demonstrate that something that people have been doing forever actually works.
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Perry said:…Only by doing controlled studies can you demonstrate that something that people have been doing forever actually works.Sorry Perry, that’s not entirely true, poorly formulated, or even plain wrong.A more precise formulation would be rather something like: only with controlled studies (by preference double-blind and placebo controlled) and identification of the active principle and it’s molecular target can one be scientifically fairly certain that it does or does not work better than no (or placebo, respectively) treatment. Whether or not said ‘better’ is actually good enough is not even answered and has to be defined beforehand. Alas, with plant preparations (especially multi-component mixtures found in TCM, Ayurveda, and TTM) at least one if not all of these thee criteria are impossible or at least not feasible. Our limited understanding of complex biochemical processes and other constraints simply prevent scientific proof for many herbal preparations. There are other studies such as observational studies which can give sufficient evidence especially if thousands of people have been doing it forever. Such studies may not hold up to the high demands and expectations of modern medicine and the pharmaceutical industry but they can give (and have done so many times) a sound lead and are what pharmacognosy is all about; it’s also what lead to the discovery of many of the modern drugs.Ginger would be a good example (probably because I did my PhD on it): Observing the use for thousands of years and the indications for which it has been used lead (me :blush: ) to several working hypotheses (probable mode of action) of which all but one (which was messed up due to contaminations) proved right.On the other hand, antidepressants and antipsychotics allegedly work as has been proven times and times again in state of the art clinical trials. Turns out, most of these trials have been wrong after all: Only ~1% of some of the effects (for example with depression) are cause by the drugs, ~1/3 by the disposition of the patient (positive expectation, changes in lifestyle) and ~2/3 by the doctor-patient relationship (how sympathetic the shrink was to the patient), and a negligible part was due to the skills of the psychiatrist. Even an open placebo (= the doctor tells the patient that he’s prescribing a placebo) does about as much as a pharmaceutical pill in said field… imagine that for a second! Another ‘fun’ fact is that one out of five people experiences at least one crisis in life which, from a scientifically proven point of view, could and should be treated with such drugs.Another example is MSM: First, it was DMSO which got obsolete and forgotten, then MSM resurfaced in social media due to misinterpretation of a dusty dug-out publication, and became a hype. A tremendously lucrative nutrient supplement market profited from it and $$$ started flowing. About a dozen years later, science and research got funds and joined in… and could prove that the seemingly idiotic and negligent use of MSM for literally million-fold self-experimentations was actually working and was safe (though we still don’t know how MSM works).Bottom line is: If thousands of people do something for a very long time, then chances are high that it actually works (how it works is a different story). Mind, it doesn’t necessarily mean that it isn’t harmful (alcohol, tobacco, FGM, and unprotected intercourse being just some examples)!
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@Pharma - Perhaps I could have been a bit more precise in my words to convey better what I meant because you developed a mistaken impression of my meaning. Yes, I would agree with this… “only with controlled studies (by preference double-blind and placebo controlled) and identification of the active principle and it’s molecular target can one be scientifically fairly certain that it does or does not work better than no (or placebo, respectively) treatment.”
I don’t disagree that there are things in plant extracts that are eventually studied and shown to work. And that there are things that passed double blind placebo controls and later failed. I don’t fully understand what that has to do with anything I wrote.You’ve also misread (or misinterpreted what I wrote) when I wrote “…it isn’t noticeably harmful“. I wasn’t claiming that it was not harmful. I was just saying it wasn’t going to immediately kill you.
“If thousands of people do something for a very long time, then chances are high that it actually works“ - I disagree. People are easily fooled & often maintain behaviors for irrational reasons. Millions of people have been praying to God for thousands of years. That doesn’t mean God ever actually answers, that prayer works or that God even exists.
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Thank you everybody for all the great input and comments! I appreciate it a lot.
For the record, I absolutely believe DIY beauty with authentic herbal extracts, when done right, works. An ingredient might not work on someone who is allergic to that specific ingredient, of course, but that is true of synthetic ingredients too. Ayurveda is 3000 years old and has proven to work thousands of times when modern medicine failed.
Remember- scientific theories and facts get proven wrong all the time! It doesnt mean that we shouldn’t rely on science, it just means we should be open minded and respect technological advancements
Thank you again for all the input! -
I’ll just leave this here.
https://skepticalinquirer.org/exclusive/ayurveda-ancient-superstition-not-ancient-wisdom/If you want to know whether an ingredient has measurable benefits, then you have to look at what has been scientifically studied.
If you already believe an ingredient has benefits, then there is no reason to study further. Just see what Ayurveda books have to say and follow that.
The fact that scientific theories & ideas get shown to be wrong is a feature of the system not a bug. In that way, old, outdated ideas get discarded for newer, more reliable knowledge.
This is the biggest problem with ancient ideas like Ayurveda or TCM. They are a belief system, they are not a system of reliable knowledge. They have no way of discarding bad ideas like Bloodletter (which is a feature of Ayurveda).
I agree people should be open minded. We should also be skeptical and humble about what we can really know. Much of what we think we know is probably wrong in some way. But we know a lot more than the ancients.
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Pharma saiGinger would be a good example (probably because I did my PhD on it): Observing the use for thousands of years and the indications for which it has been used lead (me :blush: ) to several working hypotheses (probable mode of action) of which all but one (which was messed up due to contaminations) =
I’m with Perry re. the science of such clinical study and am curious regarding satisfaction of a PhD without it. Certainly citing thousands of years would not be adequate. Can you explain, please?
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Perry said:I’ll just leave this here.
https://skepticalinquirer.org/exclusive/ayurveda-ancient-superstition-not-ancient-wisdom/I find the author was quite ignorant, arrogant and prejudice against Ayurveda.
“That just about sums it up. Ayurveda is basically superstition mixed with a soupçon of practical health advice.” based her opinion on Ayurveda from only Deepak Chopra.And dishing on India was quite unfair.
“Ayurveda originated in India and is still widely used there. In a list of longevity by country, India ranked 125th. That suggests that the “science of life” hasn’t done a very good job of keeping people alive. But if the Indians see it differently and want to rely on “ancient wisdom” instead of on modern science-based medicine, it’s their funeral (sometimes literally!). Deepak Chopra is the most prominent proponent of Ayurveda in the United States. He was trained in India; in my opinion, America would have been better off if he had stayed there.”For me Deepak Chopra practice is more like a cult with Ayurveda front.
Sometimes modern drugs are prescribed together with herbal remedies for symptom relief aids.
It’s true there’re weird homemade, no evidence-based, unregulated herbal regimens from fake doctor or real doctor turned herbal expert selling with high profits.
Perry said:This is the biggest problem with ancient ideas like Ayurveda or TCM. They are a belief system, they are not a system of reliable knowledge. They have no way of discarding bad ideas like Bloodletter (which is a feature of Ayurveda).If NIH would look into Indian and Chinese studies rather than relying on only American studies, there might be somethings other than just a belief. I humbly believe working together will take us further than working alone but I doubt I will see it in my life time.
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Pattsi said:
If NIH would look into Indian and Chinese studies rather than relying on only American studies, there might be somethings other than just a belief. I humbly believe working together will take us further than working alone but I doubt I will see it in my life time.
Not aware of NIH - perhaps they have looked into relevant cultural cure claims. I know industry has and typically finds little to no efficacy tho there are rare and notable exceptions.
The Western concept of science has driven profound innovation - what other study concept do you see in China and India ? -
“If NIH would look into Indian and Chinese studies rather than relying on only American studies, there might be somethings other than just a belief.“
@Pattsi - NIH does grant funding to foreign researchers so if a research group from China of India had a suitable study, the NIH would consider them.
https://grants.nih.gov/grants/who-is-eligible.htm It is not just a problem of Americans not looking at other systems of knowledge. It is because there is a fundamental flaw with these systems.
1. Ayurveda - Is based on non-existent energies called vata, pitta and kapha. This is pre-scientific superstition. You can’t test how well something that is made up works.
2. TCM - Is based on the unproven, non-scientific concepts of qi, meridians, and acupuncture points. It is little more than superstition.
And there are numerous studies that have looked at treatments from these systems. https://www.nccih.nih.gov/health/traditional-chinese-medicine-what-you-need-to-know
I agree people need to be humble. We need to be humble enough to accept when something we wish to be true turns out not to be true.
Many people wish that putting plant extracts on their skin will provide some exceptional benefit. But the evidence shows us that this is largely false.
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Pattsi said:If NIH would look into Indian and Chinese studies rather than relying on only American studies, there might be somethings other than just a belief. I humbly believe working together will take us further than working alone but I doubt I will see it in my life time.Agree. combination can make us Healthier.
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@PhilGeis @Perry Sorry, I didn’t mean to say to do the research on the whole Ayurveda and TCM, I myself think the concept of energies or elements is quite nonsense. But I will have to leave a room for the wave–particle duality quantum physics thing which I have no understanding enough to make a comment - maybe or maybe not we will have more to learn in the future.
What I meant is there interesting herbal remedy and yoga or tai chi movement which might or may have potential benefit, I would want to see a more proper method rather than observe-based study.
In US, alternative medicine, Ayurvedic and TCM - ish wellness products make quite a huge money so I can’t see a company would want to fund a research which has a potential to pop their bubble.
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Pattsi - the research would come from a company considering pursuit of the category who wouldn’t worry at reporting if they found no substance.
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The main issue, from my point of view as someone directly concerned with it, is that plants can’t be patented or otherwise protected. Also, companies interested in plants and traditional herbal remedies tend to be small (big pharma pursues other, more lucrative avenues of drug discovery) and simply don’t have the funds to pay for large scale clinical trials.
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I’m familiar with extensive large company investigating naturals - not only traditionals but discovery - with very little success. AND with over-eager managers driving acquistion of herbal companies bypassing due diligence only to discover the products totally failed their claims under technical scrutiny.
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I love ancient herbs. But we lack research behind them.
Companies have to come-up with budgets to fund research.
But companies also want sustainable or easily available(cheaper) ingredients and hence they focus more amazonian forest or marine or biotechnological.
Ayurvedic or Chinese herbs are already expensive and have alternate uses. Hence much research is not going behind them.Also powder masks with herbs work well.
Also Ayurvedic recipes have oil recipes of simmering herbal decoctions in oil. And I saw one paper that says water soluble components are present in the these oil without any emulsifiers.Also most of the ayurvedic cosmetic products you see in the US spa market are not truly Ayurvedic. As ayurvedic only has 3 kinds of formulas with 10-15 ingredints each. One, fresh herbal pastes. Two, herbal powders(made as decoction and consumed internally or applied on). Three, decoctions simmered in oils.
In my experience they all three work well.
I have seen increase in hair growth with ayurvedic oils. Brighter skin with powders.Problem is,
1. We cannot standardise the % of active ingredient with every batch
2. No research on side effects or even effectiveness to make claims
3. Plants are wild grown not cultivated, some times they can be different sub species based on the location collected.I personally use those powders and oils.
But as a cosmetic maker I dont include tradition herbs in our products except when they are standardised by companies and there is proven research behind them.
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