Home Cosmetic Science Talk Formulating Lemongrass Essential Oil in Body Wash

  • Lemongrass Essential Oil in Body Wash

    Posted by ozgirl on October 3, 2017 at 2:05 am

    Hi,

    I am just wondering if anyone has had any success incorporating Lemongrass essential oil into a body wash. I have a customer who wants this but my attempt to add it to our body wash formula has been unsuccessful with the essential oil oxidising and going yellow in a very short time.

    I have spoken to my fragrance supplier and he thinks that it will be difficult to stop the oxidation even if I add an anti-oxidant like BHT.

    Unfortunately I cannot change the body wash formula.
     
    There are body wash products on the market with Lemongrass but the majority seem to be a blend with other essential oils.

    Any thoughts or experiences that anyone would be willing to share would be most appreciated.

    Thanks
    :)

    chemnc replied 6 years, 6 months ago 5 Members · 6 Replies
  • 6 Replies
  • zaidjeber

    Member
    October 3, 2017 at 2:22 am

    Hi @ozgirl I did use lemongrass water extract (more of a decoction) in body wash before, it was successful and we still produce the same body wash with the same decoction. 

  • ozgirl

    Member
    October 5, 2017 at 10:29 pm

    @zaidjeber Thanks for the information. Unfortunately I don’t think that will work in my current situation but it is always good to remember there are different approaches you can take.

  • bill_toge

    Member
    October 5, 2017 at 11:02 pm

    that’s most likely down to the myrcene content in the oil; myrcene contains a conjugated diene group and is therefore very prone to oxidation / side-reactions

    do you absolutely have to use the oil? if you don’t, you could go to a fragrance house to get a synthetic fragrance blend that smells like lemongrass but is less prone to oxidation

  • das

    Member
    October 5, 2017 at 11:08 pm

    If you don’t want to change the formula your only option is to change the formula of the fragance. A blend of antioxidants and a different vehicle did the trick for me, but still you need to test it and see how it behaves in time. Even when it seemed stable I saw slight color changes after 6 months, citrics are tricky even when they are compensated with sinthetics. 

  • ozgirl

    Member
    October 5, 2017 at 11:55 pm

    @Bill_Toge  and @DAS

    Thanks for the information. I think a synthetic fragrance might be easiest in the long run.

  • chemnc

    Member
    October 7, 2017 at 12:29 am

    We have lemongrass in some formulations and with 0.15 Rosamox never had a problem.

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