Wrinkles and Supplements

Your Collegian fibers must be at full operating strength to help prevent wrinkles

Wrinkles are certainly not something new as they have been around since the beginning of time, and there have been some very interesting as well as dangerous treatments used to slow or prevent them.

However, supplements that include vitamins and mineral are not among this dangerous group, and if utilized properly, they can be extremely helpful in controlling and even reducing wrinkles.Although they can never be totally eliminated, there is still a lot of ways to control them and help to improve your appearance.

What are wrinkles?

In fully understanding wrinkles and supplements, it is very helpful to have a basic understanding about what they are. It is also quite interesting to learn about some of the treatments that have been throughout history.

Wrinkles are very easy to understand as they are folds and or creases in your skin, and when you are in your younger years, these cells can very easily adjust to any type of wrinkle and return your skin to its smooth surface through a process referred to as proliferation and organization of skin cells.

However, as you start to age, this process will start to break down slightly as your skin becomes thinner, but this is not the only reason for wrinkles to develop. There are also organized columns of cells in the outer layer of your skin, referred to as the epidermis that can also become less effective.

Collegian fibers in your dermis, which is the layer of skin between the epidermis and the subcutaneous, may also begin to weaken in this process. These fibers help to maintain your skins integrity, and the major reason that they become less effective is that they also become less organized as well as decrease in both their density and numbers.

Your elastin fibers, which are smooth and ribbon like, are also affected in the aging or damaging process and they become less resilient, denser, as well as a lot coarser in nature. When all of the factors combine, wrinkles start to develop in your skin. Wrinkles also have two major causes; intrinsic and extrinsic.

If it is intrinsic, it is believed to be a genetic issue where your skin reaches a certain point where it will no longer grow properly.

When this occurs, the growth factors that stimulate DNA replication as well as cell division, begins to lose its ability to function at full capacity and each time it is called upon, it takes slightly longer to react.

If the cause is extrinsic, it is usually the result of something you have done to your skin the affects the process and there are two major underlying causes; smoking and sunlight exposure, and with either form, this is where wrinkles and supplements start their journey together.

If you smoke, you are basically causing the normal process to speed up, and this is why it is referred to as premature wrinkling. Direct exposure to sunlight or UVB light, also has several potential dangers if not properly protected, and wrinkles are one of them.

Direct exposure to UVB light can very easily damage your amino acids and it these acids that are the building blocks of several types of skin cells.

If any one of these cells becomes damaged, it can release energy that damages their chemical bonds. If your skin is not protected properly by sunscreens, this damage can occur in less than five minutes of exposure.

History:

Wrinkles and supplements are certainly not new to the 20th century, as they have been around for thousands of years. However, they were much different forms of supplements than modern vitamins and minerals.

The Egyptians had several treatments for wrinkles, and one of them consisted of wax, a mixture of incense, olive oil, as well as milk and cyperus that would be applied for six consecutive days.

The French in the early 1700’s used flowers of elder, mallows, and beans that were added to the pulp of melon. They also added honey and egg whites in an attempt to remove wrinkles. Arsenic soap and wafers were used as recently as the early 1900’s, as was plain old paint in an attempt to hide the damage.

This was quickly stopped, however, after the dangers of both mercury and lead were discovered.

Wrinkles and Supplements:

Wrinkles and supplements has come a long way in just the last fifty years, and now it is widely held that there are several extremely helpful supplements that can drastically slow and reduce this process. They include Retin-A, Vitamin A, C and E, as well as the mineral Selenium.

Wrinkles and supplements first form of attack is with tretinion, which is a vitamin A compound that is much better known as Retin-A. It cannot undo severe damage, but is believed to be extremely beneficial is eliminating crows-feet as well as fine lines that are the result of either the intrinsic or extrinsic causes.

Retin-A was originally developed in the fight against acne as it is extremely effective at cleaning out clogged pores in your skin, but it also helps to stimulate cell growth and turnover. It does this by stimulating the collagen production as well as the blood flow in the dermis layer of skin.

However, these claims can be a dime a dozen, so it was put to a test at the University of Michigan where they closely monitored 29 people that had sun damaged skin. This test lasted for 12 months and those participants that were given a cream that had Retin-A had an 80 percent increase in collagen production as compared to only 14 percent that had cream without it.

The next factor in wrinkles and supplements is vitamin C, for one very important reason; it helps to manufacture collagen in your body naturally. This vitamin is critical for keeping all of your connective tissues functioning properly, but the recommended levels are believed to do very little in fighting wrinkles.

Lorraine Meiser, PhD., University of Wisconsin, suggests that in order for this vitamin to be effective in fighting wrinkles, you need at least a 300 to 500 milligram dosage daily to be effective, especially if you smoke. She also suggests topical sun preparations that contain high dosages of vitamin C if you spend a lot of time in direct sunlight.

Next on the list of wrinkles and supplements is vitamin E, which is extremely effective in treating skin damage from sunlight. This vitamin is a free radical natural antioxidant, and is growing in popularity in the oil form in fighting sun exposure.

Vitamin E oil is easily available in most any drugstore, but it should also be used in supplement form as well. The recommend dosage orally is 400 units daily to help protect your skin from wrinkles.

The last of the list is the mineral Selenium, and it works very closely with vitamin E. It also helps to protect your body from free radical damage caused by both sun exposure and smoking, and in several parts of the world it is found abundantly in the soil.

It should also be taken daily but only in the daily recommend dosage and should not exceed 100 micrograms unless directly supervised by a physician. Garlic, onions, and broccoli are natural sources of Selenium.

Summary:

Wrinkles and supplements and the benefits they can provide have come a long way in just the last 50 years, and although they can never be totally stopped, they can very easily be controlled by both diet as well as supplementation and they are much safer than putting paint on your face.

Wrinkles and Supplements

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