So many people around the world want to get a tanned look on their skin. Now, staying for hours under the sun might give you the tan, but it can also have other adverse impacts on the body. This might lead to skin damage; you might end up dehydrated and the likes. This is the reason a lot of artificial tanning methods are being used. One effective method to tan your skin is to use of tanning lotion. These are home methods of getting the perfect skin color. But how does tanning lotion work? To answer this question, let us go through the details.
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Ingredients of a tanning lotion
Dihydroxyacetone (DHA): This is possibly the most important ingredient involved in a tanning lotion. It is nothing but a colorless sugar that reacts with the skin. It works well on the dead cells of the skin located in the epidermis. This interaction actually changes the color of the skill cells.
Erythrulose: This is another important chemical present in tanning lotions. These usually work towards in combination with DHA, trying to boost the performance.
Tyrosine: This is an amino acid that is often found in a lot of tanning lotions. This helps stimulate melanin formation thereby allowing the tanning process to take place and take shape even faster.
A good tanning lotion can only work with the combination of all the essential elements.
How Does Tanning Lotion Work?
The skin is made up of one very important layer known as the epidermis. Now in this layer there are rows of skins cells that die every day and remain attached to the skin. The ingredients of a good tanning lotion will work on the amino acids of these dead cells in order to change the color of the skin externally by the production of melanoidins. This might be done by increasing the melanin content of the skin.
The more the melanin in your skin, the darker is your skin color. But you have to keep in mind that the effect of DHA is not immediate. It will take at least 2 hours to 3 days for the color to actually settle in.
Why are Tanning Lotions so Effective?
Tanning lotions are very effective measures to get a tan on your skin. These are better than the other sun tan lotions. This is because instead of blocking the effects of the UV rays, these enhance the effects of the same. This in turn helps you get the darker hues on your skin a lot faster. Plus, unlike the natural options, tanning lotions remove the risk of skin burns.
Tanning lotions are not permanent
Since tanning lotions work on the dead cells only, your artificial tan is not likely to stay on for more than a month at most. This is because the dead cells that randomly stick to the skin on the epidermis are gotten rid of in 30 to 40 days. Thus, you have to keep redoing the tanning sessions in order to keep a continuous color on the skin.
