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I like how they marked Xanthan Gum as “sourced from non-GMO plant”. Does it mean everything else is from GMO-plants?))))

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Well it is obviously fake. Azelaic Acid is poorly soluble in water so you need a solvent. Solvent would be preceding Azelaic Acid. Also Ascorbic Acid is not stabilized and would oxidize in days giving color. Plus Carbomer should be neutralized to gel, but the product has a lot of acids and probably is meant to have low pH. So I don’t think this product is legit

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What do you mean? Fatty alcohols have been used for ages in o/w emulsions as structuring agents.

Edit: Sorry, I misread, you mean w/o…

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Thank you both! Now it is clear to me

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Perry and Valerie answered this question in episode 326 of the beauty brains podcast

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I see you’re into neural network these days. Try stable diffusion network (there are many tutorials on YouTube, search dream booth). It can generate photo of you in any amplua by textual description. Makes appearance even better than Glycerin ????

P.S. my avatar is generated by this NN.

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I think they just added two masses like it is one molecule. But as I understand cetearyl alcohol is not a molecule but a mix of ingredients? I am not a chemist and I am not sure if molecular weight can be applied to a mix of ingredients?

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Once I had an experiment to mix salicylic acid with poloxamer liquid. It reacted to form lumps of gel in water. So you can try this to check if it Poloxamer in bought solution. This also described in https://patents.google.com/patent/EP2242476A2/en:

For example salicylic acid can cause Poloxamer to gel

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Zinc Oxide is not soluble in water\oils. It is usually micronized and evenly dispersed is some medium like silicones (especially in sunscreens). In homemade products your only option is to shake the bottle.

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It could be hydrolate reacting with some of the other ingredients into insoluble compound, which falls down to the bottom.

In any case you can exclude some ingredients and see if the residue occurs again. E.g. make the same formula, but without arbutin and observe. Or the same formula, but without hydrolate and observe

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There was a study recently discussed on reddit regarding stability of retinol in commercial products. The results are surprising since most expensive serums are most unstable and less expensive serum is more stable. So you can take a look at antioxidants used for that product (there is a table). Looks like Tocopherol Acetate is not enough, they used ascorbic acid + sodium ascorbyl phosphate + EDTA + BHT + tocopheryl acetate.

Surprisingly Granactive retinoid showed the best stability, so if you use it you can take a look at The Ordinary serum and see what formulation they used.

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Meemcha said:

Among my favorite ingredients are peptides, vit C (been playing with 3-0-ethyl ascorbic acid lately), ceramides and salicylic acid (not in a same product though). 

How do you like 3-O-ethyl ascorbic acid? I played a bit with it, it oxidized even quicker than plain ascorbic acid ((

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https://beurre.ua
Ukrainian seller I buy from. If I am not mistaken they have EU shipment

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chemicalmatt said:

@GeorgeBenson, it would take an entire seminar here to explain the utility of butylene glycol in cosmetic formulation. A short answer: aside from freeze-point depression, anything propylene glycol can do, butylene glycol does better the only drawback is it costs 3X more than PG. Also, humectant and preservative booster are the two least important characteristics of BG; in fact it does not perform either very well at all.

So where it performs very well then? As a solvent?

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You can see Phospholipids in the ingredients. This means the retinol on encapsulated in Phospholipids and that’s probably how it can be miscible in water.
Also, they have surfactants Polysorbate 20 and Octoxynol-9 which can help solubilize oil soluble components 

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Graillotion said:

A lot of people globally get their material from a Thai site.  They ship DHL…and can pretty much hit any spot on the globe in 5-7 days.

They have a massive selection.  Sometime things are a little hard to find….as they might list all their emollients under the name: ‘LipidSoft _____’  But once you learn their idiosyncrasies, nothing but fun.

MySkinRecipes.com

Did you try to order there? Is it legit? I heard some of this sellers just send you a fake ingredient (e.g. plain ascorbic acid instead of 3-o-ethyl)

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2. Lets say i want to have a waterless skincare line;

You don’t want to. You don’t have even basic knowledge of chemistry. Skincare is not food, it is not like you can mix ingredients and see what happens.
This is just dangerous for those who will buy it. I though you are just a DIY person you does it as a hobby, but now I see you gonna make products for sale. I will not answer your questions anymore. Please live real products to professionals. 

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1. I have been wondering if inactive ingredients really play a role in formulations?

It depends on what you mean by “active” or “inactive”. Same ingredient can either or both in different products. But short answer is yes - “inactive” ingredients do play role in formulation. The simple reason: if you can make product without them - you will do it because it is cheaper.

2. so does this means that 10% is enough to deliver result?

There is no rule on what percentage it should be, it depends on the ingredient itself. For example retinol, it is used up to 1%, but tretinoin is less than 0.5%. Whereas niacinamide 1-5%, but L-ascorbic acid 10-20%. All ingredients are different and recommended dosage is usually based on studies.

3.  to have potent product we need a mix of 90%of inactives and only 10% of actives? 

No, tretinoin for example will be very “active” at <1%. There is no rule, it all depends on the ingredient. Also, delivery system matters.

4. So tHIS MEANs that an active can be at the bottom of the INCI deck and this means it is low in dosage right? 

Yes, but only till 1%. Ingredients lower than 1% can be in any order (if I remember correctly). I would not recommend you to guess on percentages based on INCI list. Because next INCI lists are the same, but percantage is different:
INCI 1: Water, Lactic Acid (10%), Glycerin (5%), Preservative
INCI 2: Water, Lactic Acid (2%), Glycerin (1%), Preservative

5. How many actives should there be in a product? 

No rules here, all you can put together to have a stable product for selling.

6. Is it possible to formulate a waterless face scrub?
Yes, scrubbing particles can be dispersed in any liquid which is non-water: oil, soft butter, glycerin, glycols, silicones etc

7. Are all waterless skincare products in the form of powder?

No. I already mentioned oils, glycerin and glycols. Take The Ordinary products, for example. Their Vitamin C products are waterless. Waterless != solid. It means explicitly no water

8. And by waterless does it mean it cant even be replaced with rose water or aloe vera?

yes, they have water inside.

9. I’ve read that water helps to dissolve many ingredients that are beneficial to skin.

True, it is the best solvent, but not all ingredients can be dissolved in water alone or at all, e.g. oils. You need to check each ingredient for solubility.

10. Can I replace water with fruit water or simply aloe vera jucie

It depends on your formulation.

11. Can the sunscreen be anhydrous and thus can i replace water with rose water?

Yes, it can be waterless. No one knows if you can replace something if you don’t specify the whole formula. It doesn’t matter anyway, because sunscreen is very difficult product to make, you need good ingredients which hard or costly to buy, a lot of knowledge and testing lab. You should never DIY sunscreen if you are not a professional (assuming from your questions you are not).

12. Will it dissolve the ingredients and also is it good for the planet? 

No one knows your formula to answer this question. 

Although I answered to some degree, I would suggest to take school chemistry classes first, then read Perry’s book and listen to podcast. It will answer most of you questions in details.
 

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marimaster_3991 said:

Hello, guys! 

I was told that carbomer could jellify glycerin to create a sort of “glycerin gel” but I’ve never heard about carbomers or other polymers becoming hydrated in other system but water. 

I read that lecigel (Sodium Acrylates Copolymer (and) Lecithin) could thicken glycerin-based gel.

Does anyone ever heard of it? or maybe have worked with this kind of formulation? 

There is a video on youtube where they put Lecigel to glucerine and steer. Maybe it will give you some idea of how they interact: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N_PWxJdrHmc

And there is a formula of the product here:
https://www.lucasmeyercosmetics.com/sites/lucasmeyer-corp-v2/files/formulation/2022-05/Enchanted%20Gel-to-Milk%2016.320.01%20C185.pdf

They have 1.5% of water in the formula to have final viscosity

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MarkBroussard said:

@Abdulla:

I do indeed make my own AHA Serum and use it in rotation with a Retinol Barrier Repair product that I make.  In terms of products that I use … Vitamin C Serum, Retinol Barrier Repair, Lactic Acid Serum, Moisturizer … I make all of these DIY.  Nice, simple routine. 

I wonder if it is some kind of fancy derivative (like THD) or plain ascorbic acid? Waterless formula?

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Of course it can. The problem comes when you add water. If your formula is pure PG - then many substances (like Salicylic Acid, Azelaic Acid) have no issues with solubility.

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Sodium Hydroxide is close to EDTA, so it should be in small amount. But this INCI list is all questionable and we can’t make assumptions on ingredients position I guess

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I am eager to hear.the answer, this question bugs me the whole day and I can’t find easy answer on the Internet

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I see your point, but could you explain how it actually should be calculated? I tried to search what is molar mass (I still suspect molecular weight is wrong term since as I understand cetearyl alcohol is a mix of two substances in some ratio) of mixes but can’t find easy answer.

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I just googled “what molecural weight has cetearyl alcohol” and every website claims it has 512+…