Ceramides
Ceramides enhance the natural skin barrier and promote skin moisturization.
What are ceramides?
Ceramides are essential lipids naturally contained in the outermost layer of skin. They make up ~50% of the outer layer of skin and form a crucial part of the skin’s barrier from the outside world.
What do ceramides do for the skin?
Ceramides work with fatty acids and cholesterol to provide the skin with a natural protective barrier against environmental stressors, including irritants and pollutants. This helps aging skin stay looking radiant for longer. Ceramides help in creating a lipid barrier that prevents skin permeability and prevents the skin from losing moisture. By preventing water loss, ceramides help to avert dryness and maintain skin flexibility. When the skin lacks ceramides, it can lead to dryness and irritation, contributing to skin sensitivity.
BENEFITS OF CERAMIDES
Protecting from external stressors is essential to maintaining skin health. To achieve this, skin integrity needs to be maintained. Ceramides hold the skin cells in the outer layer of the skin (the epidermis) within an extra intercellular matrix, thus ensuring that the skin barrier is tight and secure. This means ceramides help keep the skin resilient from external factors.
Transepidermal water loss occurs when water evaporates from the outer layer of the skin (the epidermis). This type of loss can occur following skin damage and causes moisture to be lost. As moisture is lost, skin can become dehydrated and irritated. Since ceramides work with other fatty acids and cholesterol to form a structure within the skin they can prevent this transepidermal water loss and thus prevent dehydration as well helping the skin retain its natural moisture.
The skin barrier is a complex structure that helps maintain the body’s integrity and protects it from external factors such as microbes and pollutants. Ceramides are an important part of this skin barrier as they form a key part of the lamellar sheets in the upper layer of the skin. These lamellar sheets form the lipid barrier that maintains hydration and stratum corneum flexibility.
Ceramides are a crucial ingredient in helping skin maintain a youthful radiance– they improve the function of the skin’s barrier, allow the skin to retain its moisture over a longer period of time, and help prevent structural conformations that cause fine lines and wrinkles. The skin’s natural ceramide levels can decrease due to the aging process and environmental stressors. Therefore using a product that contains ceramides can help improve the skin's barrier functionality and moisturization.
