Water soluble Essential Oils?

Formulating

Water soluble Essential Oils?

Posted by Iaskedbetter on January 16, 2015 at 10:35 am

I am looking at a facial toner INCI list and I am wondering if I am missing something. The ingredient list is:

Water

Witch Hazel Leaf Extract

Glycerin

Citrus Grandis (Grapefruit) Peel Oil

Citrus Aurantium Dulcis (Orange) Peel Oil

Hyaluronic Acid

Panthenol

Allantoin

Citrus Aurantium Bergamia (Bergamot) Fruit Oil

Sorbitol

Calcium Ascorbate

Tocopherol (Vitamin E)

Chlorophyllin-Copper Complex

Potassium Sorbate

The product is a clear, yellow tinted liquid with a strong citrus fragrance. My question is how are those essential oils (in bold) solubilized based on this IL? Are there water soluble essential oils? I appreciate any thoughts on this.

MarkBroussard replied 9 years, 4 months ago 4 Members · 8 Replies
8 Replies

MarkBroussard

Member
January 16, 2015 at 10:52 am

http://www.aromaland.com/Water_Soluble_Essential_Oils_s/240.htm
vitalys

Member
January 16, 2015 at 11:26 am

I could just assume that formulation contains three different alcohols altogether - Glycerin, Panthenol and Sorbitol ergo no additional solubilizers required to maintain the clear appearance of this product.
Bobzchemist

Member
January 16, 2015 at 11:49 am

I think it’s pretty clear that the 1% line is at or just below the glycerin, which means that they could be adding the essential oils at 0.001% or even less. At some ultra-low percentage, you could probably get those oils into the sorbitol.

Of course, the other possibility is that those three oils are part of a fragrance mix, and the company conveniently “forgot” to include the solubilizers when they wrote the ingredient list.
MarkBroussard

Member
January 16, 2015 at 11:51 am

@iaskedbetter:

is this the LOI in the order the ingredients appear on the product label?
MarkBroussard

Member
January 16, 2015 at 12:16 pm

Since orange and grapefruit peel oils can be quite irritating to the skin, BobZ is point on in his assessment. They probably use a high weight hyaluronic acid as a thickener to bind it all together. This looks like a Rhonda Allison formulation?
Iaskedbetter

Member
January 16, 2015 at 12:18 pm

@MarkBroussard Yes but I did leave some marketing extracts out. After Witch Hazel there’s 5 obvious marketing ingredients (ginger root extract, lemon balm extracts, algae extract, grapefruit leaf extract, white tea extract, and orange extract) then Glycerin.

@Bobzchemist Agree with you on the 1% line (I think it would be below witch hazel) but the mystery is how heavily fragranced the product is. There’s definitely something fragrancing this product and at first glance you would have to assume it would be the essential oils. Yet no solubilizers?

@Vitalys You think there are enough sugar alcohols so solubilize the essential oils? Even if the total was <3%?

Appreciate the thoughts guys.
Iaskedbetter

Member
January 16, 2015 at 12:23 pm

@MarkBrousard The product is very thin. Probably only slightly more viscous than water. It is a product sold by a company in Whole Foods. Excellent point about skin irritation though…I hadn’t considered that/
MarkBroussard

Member
January 16, 2015 at 12:34 pm

Your face would not be able to tolerate those essential oils at much above a fraction of a percent total. I’m sure they added just enough to get the fragrance.