Powerful Peptides And New Discoveries For Overall Health”

What are Peptides and what is their power?

Peptides are short chains of amino acids, the “building blocks” of proteins. We ingest peptides found naturally in food and we produce peptides in our bodies. The human body naturally produces more than 7,000 known peptide types and they are used for many purposes for your overall health. They are used in cell growth, hormones, neurotransmitters, anti-inflammatories, muscle building, anti-bacterial, wound healing and so much more. Those factors make peptides powerful in our overall health.

Powerful Peptides produced for overall health

The studies on peptides and their uses for overall health have produced such good results that many have been developed in laboratories to mimic naturally produced peptides/proteins. They are powerful in forming complexes that help to minimize wrinkles, support collagen production, nourish the skin, and help in skin discoloration. Peptides are also powerful in the body for muscle growth and repair, and joint recovery. We can’t stop there because they are also used in medicines for diabetes (ie Ozempic) and even multiple sclerosis.

Categorizing peptides

Peptides are mainly categorized in three different ways. Usually, grouped into how many amino acids make up the chain: Oligopeptides have few amino acids, while polypeptides are longer chains (mostly between 20 to 50). Dipeptides, tripeptides, and tetrapeptides have two, three, and four amino acids respectively.

Peptides and their powerful role in skincare

Now that you know a little about what peptides are and the role they play in your overall health. It is easy to see why they are advertised everywhere. Peptide power is not a gimmick. There is scientific evidence behind these amino acids. However, the question in skincare is how to get these powerful peptides past the skin barrier to where the body can recognize them and use them. That is when the peptide power is effective.

The tricky thing about peptides in skincare is that they also can hydrate the skin. Making your skin look more plump. In that way, they can trick you into thinking it may be working but it is just hydrating your skin. Skincare takes months to show any real improvement. That is why studies are critical in proving their effectiveness. Studies are being conducted regularly on this exact issue. One such study that I found interesting was:

Study for Skin Barrier Penetration

Disclaimer or trigger warning: The testing was done on rats,  I am not an advocate of this type of testing. However, I can't change the fact that places still do this type of testing nor can I change the fact that a cruelty free company looks at the information that was done with this kind of testing and uses it as a basis for their testing or their products.  All we can do is push for change for humans and animals. Okay, I am done with the public service announcement.

Special thanks to my daughter for telling me about trigger warnings.

The study

There is an article published on November 3, 2023, however, I believe it was first published in Frontiers of Pharmacology. In the study, they successfully combined Tripeptide-1 (GHK) with other ingredients to make a more enhanced peptide to aid skin adsorption and penetration. Of course, there is more research that will need to be done, and hopefully not in the method used in this study. However, also mentioned in this study was another one conducted by none other than L’oreal. I found it interesting and I hope that you will as well (if you want graphs, charts, and other data, you can click on the links above).

L’oreal Research

“Commercial epidermal tissues EpiSkin (L’Oréal Research and Innovation Center, Shanghai, China) is an in vitro reconstructed human epidermis (RHE) from normal human keratinocytes and is similar to the in vivohuman epidermis. EpiSkin is normally cultured on a collagen matrix at the air–liquid interface and could be removed from the nutrient agar and equilibrated in 12-well plates at 37°C and 5% CO₂ overnight. EpiSkin was treated with 2 mg/mL peptides for 24 h. The non-treated group was used as a control, and cell-penetrating peptide (CPP)-conjugated GHK was used as a positive control. The amphiphilic cell-penetrating peptide (CPP) exhibits potential advantages in terms of enhanced penetration through the skin’s lipid barrier and efficient transportation of GHK to the cellular surface, thereby demonstrating a remarkable efficacy in skin regeneration. The expression of proteins filaggrin (FLG) and loricrin (LOR) was evaluated by immunofluorescence, while the expression of mRNAs FLG and LOR in the skin was measured via qRT-PCR.”

¹ Yunnan Botanee Bio-Technology Group Co, Ltd, Kunming, Yunnan, China
² Yunnan Yunke Characteristic Plant Extraction Laboratory Co, Ltd, Kunming, Yunnan, China
³ Shanghai Jiyan Biomedical Development Co, Ltd, Shanghai, China
Corresponding author.
Edited by: Xinwang Yang, Kunming Medical University, China
Reviewed by: Yipeng Wang, Soochow University, ChinaLin Wei, Anhui Medical University, China
*Correspondence: Liping Qu, nc.anoniw@gnipiluq
Received 2023 Jul 27; Accepted 2023 Oct 9.
Copyright © 2023 He, Wang and Qu.

If you just want to skip to the bottom of the article to see some skincare products with these peptides in them.

Penetrating the skin barrier with peptide power

Peptides are extremely effective when they penetrate the skin barrier. That is when they have the most potential to be powerful in wound healing. Yes, aging gracefully has quite a lot to do with wound healing. We are trying to repair the damage we have done in the past or with our environment or just cell death to our skin or body. That is why delivery systems in all of our products are important, not just in skincare, but for medications or muscle repair. The peptides need to get where they can work.

Increasing the absorption

Some studies have found that combining them with other ingredients that have the potential to allow better absorption could be the answer. Some have found that small peptides can also travel further in the skin by themselves. Still, others are using things like probiotics that the skin recognizes already to “guide” the peptide below the upper layers of the skin. Brands are using this information to formulate products for better absorption currently, but there is more to come in peptide power.

What is the cost?

Most peptides are not expensive to reproduce. However, delivery systems can be more costly to incorporate. Money spent on testing is not cheap and more extensive testing is very expensive. I don’t think you should spend over $100 on any topical skin care. There may be one that might have been worth that price tag but that is one out of a million or more.

The peptides in these studies are in some skincare

Have you heard of peptides used in this study? You may know a bit about it as it is formulated in The Ordinary’s Multi-Peptide + Copper Peptides 1% Serum . This product is well-known and loved by many.

It contains Copper Tripeptide-1, I believe that ingredient is right at the top. As for a complex delivery system, I could not find anything that indicated that there is a complex delivery system in this product. However, the peptides in this product are combined with an ingredient/probiotic that has been studied to be beneficial in penetrating that barrier. GHK-cu is also in this product and that is a strong peptide in the world of wound repair and has a proven track history in overall skin health. I would say that this is a good peptide product, especially for the price.

The ordinary states that this product can’t be combined with actives or a lot of other ingredients (see the Deceim website). They would know their formulation better than others, so I would probably follow it for the best results. Simple formulations (like the one found in this product) don’t mean that it doesn’t work. Simple isn’t bad, it doesn’t have that luxury feel, but it is a serum. For added benefit, it has other peptides in this formulation, it is worth the price of $32.00 for all of the ingredients in here. In future posts, I will go into the ingredients in depth and their roles in your skin health.

COPPER AMINO ISOLATE SERUM 3 1:1 (CAIS3)

Now, if you want a more complex formulation, there are more on the market. Even more from the Deceim Company, under their brand, NIOD (which is one of my favorite brands).

This product does have a bigger price tag, it is $62.00 for 15ml or 1/2 ounce or $93.00 for 30ml or 1 ounce. It has a smaller-sized tripeptide that can get to the other layers below the skin barrier. Its 2nd ingredient is glycerin which is an ingredient that I favor over hyaluronic acid because it holds moisture no matter what climate you are subjected to. Of course, there are other peptides/tripeptides in this product as well. Overall, this is a great product for aiding in collagen production. Deceim also makes another similar product but I don’t like the texture, so I won’t be including it in this post.

With both of these products, I don’t love the packaging. I put pumps on mine as soon as I open one. Some of their products come with a pump, so I wish the latter one did as well for that price.

Naturium’s Multi-Peptide Advanced Serum

I will say that I included this one for its ability to play nice with other ingredients or products in your routine. It has a good price point at $25.00 for 1oz. I do like the feel of this product probably for the shea butter and squalane. Naturium has hyped this one up considerably which also makes me suspicious if it is really up to their marketing. However, this one does have some encapsulated ingredients that reach deeper into the skin.

Like I said, I liked the feel of it on the skin and the “idea” of the product is superior. It has ferulic acid, arginine, glycerin, and sunflower oil. All great ingredients. The only drawback with this one is I feel like it has more moisturizing properties than peptides. Not that peptides are the one thing you can use for wound healing or skin repair. They certainly are not.

Whichever product you choose or don’t choose, I hope this article helped you know what peptides are and what a powerful player they are in overall skin health.