The past, present, and future of looking good: how far would you go to look your best? Discover the ultimate style-setter: chemistry!

Science World, Dec 8, 2003 by Sarah Fewster

You roll out of bed and look in the mirror--think Scary Movie 3. On a scale of 1 to 10, this bad-hair day is a-20. What do you do? Well, if you were Cleopatra (Egypt's queen from 51 to 30 B.C.), you'd reach for bear-grease hair gel! Fortunately, science has advanced the cause of looking good into an art. How have grooming rituals changed over time? Read on to find, out.

Ancient Grooming

Recently, archaeologists dug up a tin of 2,000-year-old cosmetic cream in the ruins of a Roman temple near London, England. When they opened the container, they found the finger marks of its owner still in the cream! "This is such a rare discovery. To find finger marks is extraordinary. We are literally touching hands with history," says archaeologist Nansi Rosenberg. It just goes to show, people have cared about looking good for ages. In fact, Egyptians and Romans had their cosmetics buried with them so they could shine in the afterworld.

Scientists are still busy analyzing the ancient cream's chemical components, but they suspect that it is a moisturizer made from donkey's milk. And--guess what?--today's moisturizing lotions use some of the same chemistry.

The body has its own natural moisturizer called sebum--a waxy lubricant secreted by glands at the base of hair follicles to moisturize your hair and skin. But regular washing and cold weather remove sebum. That's where artificial moisturizers come in: "They work in two ways," says Dianna Kenneally, a scientist at Procter & Gamble (P & G). "They create barriers, like plastic wrap. Or they hold water in the cell, like a sponge."

Want to keep your skin's outer layer, the epidermis, smooth and soft? Slather on that moisturizer! All moisturizing creams contain fats, a type of lipid (organic compound that stores energy) that coats your skin. The fats repel water and prevent your skin's natural moisture from evaporating into thin air.

Molecules are the real beauty secret behind moisturizers. They're the smallest part of a substance containing at least two atoms. But not every molecule acts the same. Water is a polar molecule--it clings to other molecules. But it can't cling to lipids, which are nonpolar molecules. That's why water and oil, a nonpolar molecule, don't mix. If you were to coat your skin with lotion that contained polar molecules, it would pull the moisture right out of your epidermis. Talk about crocodile skin! But since moisturizers contain nonpolar lipids, they lock in your body's natural moisture.

So the next time you slather on lotion, rest assured: You're not only engaging in an ancient ritual dating back two millennia. You're also protecting your skin from the harsh elements--like skin-drying wind and pore-clogging dirt.

Today's Hair-Raiser

Soccer superstar David Beckham isn't the first to turn heads with a hairstyle. In the 1700s, the French sensation Madame de Pampadour created a fad with her "pompadour"--a tower of hair teased, combed high, and smoothed with a waxy mixture of beef marrow, skin, bone, and hazelnut oil. Yuck!

What's the chemical lowdown on hair? Inside each hair core is keratin, bundles of long chains of protein (organic molecules). Keratin gives hair its strength.

Molecules on a keratin chain bond, or link to each other, and the kind of bond they form determines whether hair is curly or straight. In straight hair, bonds form between adjacent molecules; when a molecule bonds with another molecule further down the line, it creates a curl or wave.

Sometimes your hair needs extra help looking its best. Gels and waxes are synthetic polymers (human-made chemicals) made of long protein chains. "Some polymers are rigid, like plastic bottles," says Kenneally. "But some are long and stretchy, like rubber or a plastic bag."

Most water-soluble (polar molecules that stick to water) polymers--like those in hair gel--dry to a rigid state. As gel dries, it forms a film on, and physically bonds with, the hair. But waxes are softer polymers. They don't dry completely, so you can mold and remold them. That way you can change your do faster than the leading trendsetters.

Tomorrow's Cosmetic Chemistry

Imagine a small electronic patch that lets moisturizer penetrate deep into your cells. Or a powder that scatters light and masks your skin's imperfections. Inspired by biotechnology and medical research, cosmetic chemists have gone high-tech.

In its latest wrinkle cream--Olay Regenerist--P&G turned to wound-healing medical research from the National Institutes of Health. P&G cosmetic chemists studied collagen, a large protein found in the dermis, or thick under-layer of the skin. Collagen's long fibers are extremely flexible and make skin elastic. As you age and lose collagen, skin sags and forms wrinkles. But when you cut yourself, some collagen strands break--and signal the body to repair itself by producing more collagen.

P&G cosmetic chemists isolated the small section of collagen responsible for the signal. Then they bonded the collagen with a lipophilic, or oil-clinging, molecule that helps it penetrate the epidermis. The hope? Lipophilic molecules will deposit healing collagen below the skin and repair aging wrinkles. Sound promising? Just don't count on it to turn back time.