Explore the World of Cosmetic Formulation with Chemist Kelly Dobos

0:02Hey guys, welcome back to Skincare Anarchy. This is your host Ekta and I am super super excited about our guest today because she is truly brilliant in the field of chemistry and everything that has to do with you know cosmetic chemistry anything we want to learn about as consumers you know in the beauty space i could not think of a more knowledgeable guest to have on to really educate us on this topic and do a deeper dive you know than we're really used to on a day-to-day basis so without further ado i want to introduce you guys to kelly dobos she is a consultant cosmetic chemist and adjunct professor of cosmetic science for both the University of Toledo and the University of Cincinnati.

0:41Kelly also has 25 years of expertise in developing both skincare and color cosmetic formulations. She's worked with notable companies like Bonnie Bell, Purell, Cow USA, so lots and lots of experience. So welcome to the show, Kelly. I'm so honored to host you. Well, thank you for having me. I'm excited. Yeah, I'm really thrilled to have this opportunity to kind of you know like I said pick your brain a little bit and learn from you because you know as you know the beauty space is so vast and we see so many products but unfortunately a lot of all a lot of consumers including myself you know we get stuck at that you know part where you're looking at the inky list and just trying to decipher you know what is this and even with me you know I went to pre-med took organic chemistry but I some of these names still they're just get me you know like what am I looking at kind of thing so I know a lot of people feel that way you know where there's a lot of confusion so I will I would want to dive into that later but I would love to learn more about you if you could tell us about your your background and your education and just really what got you into chemistry sure I you know as a young adult and even as a child always fascinated by the the kind of the natural world around me and always trying to understand how things worked on a deeper level.

2:01And when I got to college, I really leaned towards studying chemistry because I liked understanding how things worked on that molecular level and how you can translate into the way things behave around you, like the way that hydrogen bonding is responsible for the many unique properties of water and how those are also the same properties that are, you know, driving the way humectants work in skincare. But, you know, when I graduated, I didn't know there was such a thing as cosmetic chemistry. And I think many of my contemporaries in the field didn't really know either. I just knew I wanted to keep working in the field.

2:43And I just applied for a position as a lab assistant to get started, you know, working because I really wanted to go back and get a master's degree at some point, but I figured I should gain some real world experience. And I really fell in love with developing products and understanding how these different chemicals would go together to create a finished product. And what really kind of hooked me in the cosmetic industry was that I was making products that really made people's lives better. And whether that's, you know, a really, you know, obvious example of something like a hand sanitizer, where that material is keeping people healthy, or lipstick or lip gloss that, you know, a consumer might put on and they feel a little bolder to go out, you know, to end their day.

3:37And that's, you know, same thing for me. I, I know when I put on a red lip color, I feel a little bit bolder. And I think that's what cosmetics do is they, they help improve people's lives in many different ways. And I really liked being part of that process. And, you know, after college, when I did start working in the field, and I just really fell in love with it, I also decided I wanted to be the best cosmetic chemist I could be. For me, that was, you know, first going back and getting my, my master's in business. I really wanted to understand on a deeper level how my role in a company developing products would, you know, how I would be interacting with other groups, you know, just even thinking about supply chain and how my decisions would impact the, you know, the product development process and the accounting of a formula and what it's going to cost marketing, you know, because that's a really important aspect of cosmetic products too.

4:40I could make a really great product, but marketing group is what's going to get that first sale. But the repeat purchase, I hope, is based on the effort I put into developing a truly great and efficacious product. So getting that business degree, I think, has been really essential to helping me be a better contributor all around in product development. And I then also went to the University of Cincinnati. They have a master's degree program in cosmetic science. They have one of the oldest programs that I know of in cosmetic science and extremely well-rounded. And they made that program available to people who are already working in the field so that you can get your degree while you're working full-time, which is what I did.

5:25And I feel like that really gave me a much broader perspective on types of formulation, as well as a real depth of knowledge and things like skin biology. is so um you know i combine these two two degrees into the work that i do every day wow i love that i love that and also go bearcats we were talking forever listening before i'm i'm a uc alum as well and i i love the university they have some really great programs but that's good to know that you know it's good to know that you came into cosmetic chemistry the way you did because i think when you take a route that's fueled by true like just intrigue and just you know you're curious about something it always leads to great things I've always found that to be true you know with anyone I've spoken to in whatever industry it is I mean we were talking earlier about your review in nature that was recently published you know and it was very inspired the what you wrote and I I really like that you come from this you know from this understanding obviously from the educational side but also like you understand the the interaction that a consumer has, you know, with the products that we buy and why we buy them and what they really elicit for us, you know, as people.

6:37And that's something that I think the beauty industry, I mean, we talk a lot about things like regulations and whatnot, but we don't really get into like the psychology of that. You know, it's really, it's huge. So. And I think there's, there's a lot of things that, you know, the average consumer may not think about. We spend a lot of time looking at the chemistries of the ingredients, like emollients and how they create, you know, a particular feel when you rub them into the skin, something that could make a product feel more luxurious or a product that has a really quick rubbing because you want that fast break of a formula.

7:12So there's a lot of things in those, even those, you know, things that you might think of as just, you know, their aesthetics of the product, but we, we spend a lot of time understanding how the chemistry of the ingredients translates into those qualities. Yeah, absolutely. And that's what some of the questions I do have for you are around these things, because I won't lie to you, you know, a lot of the times, especially, for example, I'm going to give you like, I think the classic example I've seen recently when it comes to, for example, texture in a formulation. So you know, that whole snail mucin craze that was going on on TikTok for I don't know how many weeks that was, but people were obsessed, right?

7:49And I feel like a lot of brands came out with these really thick you know like just glycerin based products that were just I guess I don't know supposed to mimic that product you know that was snail mucin or whatever so I guess a big question I have is when it comes to making products that are you know appealing to the texture trends or whatever you want to call it where somebody you know maybe consumers are more gravitating towards like thicker form you know thicker formulations or something what does that entail for the cosmetic chemists like do you have to change a whole formula around to be able to change like the consistency of it or is it really kind of I mean is that easy to do a lot of times when we start a product development process we have a kind of a product brief that'll describe to us what you want the product to feel like and look like.

8:46And it's really, you know, it takes a lot of experience to, to understand where to start because there are thousands of ingredients in cosmetics that we can use to create a particular product. And when it comes to the texture and the viscosity or what we also refer to as the rheology of a product, we have many ways to influence that as well. So when it comes to say the rheology, the thickness of a product, but also how it shears. So I also want it to be thick, but maybe I want it to come out of a pump. So then I have to have what's called shear thin viscosity in that product. And we have, we have different materials that are different types of polymers and they could be natural and they could be synthetic, or there are also clays like bentonite and hectarite clays that we can use as well to, to create those different textures and feels.

9:41And then you can add on top of that, we've got fatty alcohols that'll make a cream or lotion or even a hair conditioner feel thicker and more substantial. If you've ever seen the word satiral alcohol on the label of a lotion or a hair conditioner, that really adds a lot of bulk to the product. And then you can use emollients, so different natural oils or silicones to create a different spreading on the skin. So you might want it to spread very slowly. So it has a nice, luxurious rub in, or you might want it to rub in really quickly for a product that you want to, you know, have something that's fast and easy to use.

10:20Like if you're looking to do like some sort of spray lotion, as opposed to a really thick cream. So there's, you know, lots and lots of ingredients and it's you know for me it's it's been you know this 25 years of experience in getting to work and try all these materials and I think that's something too that just takes time to to build in the industry is is learning and and being on the bench and playing with the ingredients and playing it you know kind of just trying them in different scenarios and seeing how they work together. Absolutely. No, I bet. And, you know, I've always been curious about this because I think, you know, obviously in the skincare space, a lot of people talk about things like efficacy, you know, and does a product truly work?

11:09Does it actually do what they want it to do? And many times things come up that I just wonder, you know, are these relevant things to even discuss when it comes to efficacy? And that's where I want to ask you, you know, from a cosmetic chemistry standpoint, what have you seen to be the most determining factors in a formulation that do actually impact things, you know, in relation to results that consumers can expect? I mean, it doesn't matter. And I guess what I'm saying, like, the things like change of texture, or, you know, these kind of things that we just discussed, does that really play in?

11:45Or is it just solely based on ingredients? And what are your opinions on that? So I'll start with the, when we're talking about a cosmetic formula, a skincare formula, for example, that base product is doing a lot of work. so the and there's sometimes the least sexy ingredients right so things like glycerin or petrolatum or dimethicone for example they're not making big waves in the news like snail mucin or bacuchiol right but these these materials are really what are are moisturizing the skin and bolstering the skin barrier, things like ceramides as well. Those ingredients make up a significant portion of the base and they're really doing a lot of heavy lifting.

12:38But you do have ingredients that deliver efficacy, things like retinoids, niacinamide, that are contributing benefits to the skin. And these are well-studied ingredients, right? So you want to look for science-backed ingredients. A lot of times you'll see something that is, you know, trending, really, you know, making waves in the news, but lacks a lot of substantial scientific studies to show real efficacy. And I think for me as a scientist, I go and look for the studies and, you know, confirmation of something works. And I know everyone wants to have the next big ingredient because that's differentiating in the marketplace.

13:26But, you know, sometimes those tried and true ingredients, they're still the best, they're still the gold standard. And we are all looking for the next big ingredient. But to be honest, I don't think anyone has found it, you know? Yeah, no, I know. That's why I asked you, because I feel like I see a lot of a lot of big claims, you know, with these like new extracts that people find, like, you know, like, oh, yeah, this is the 18th mushroom that we found that is going to change your life you know that kind of thing but it's just it's really my curiosity is always piqued by you know when I see different variations of something that might be similar but I noticed my skin is reacting differently you know to like one type of formulation of maybe it has like the same five hero ingredients in it right but it's like for some reason that one specific formula that i'm using it's having a better impact on my skin you know so that's where i get curious is like you know what is the real answer to like efficacy claims you know with these and these formulations like i mean i understand that ingredients obviously they matter you know you named some really great ones you know niacinamide is i think one of my all-time favorite skincare ingredients because it does so much but then again And there have been niacinamide products I've used that are like, you know, they don't do anything for me, like at all.

14:50Like I can't even utilize them on a daily basis. So that's where I wonder is like, you know, the process of creating a formulation versus sourcing your ingredients, you know, which is more important kind of thing. Sure. The process of developing the formula. So it's basically also a delivery system for that ingredient. Right. And we have ways of enhancing the efficacy of ingredients by making sure it gets to where it needs to be in the skin. And that's not always easy to tell from the label. So we're trying to enhance the efficacy of the ingredients because we also need to ensure that they're stable.

15:36A lot of ingredients that have specific efficacy in the skin, they may not be so stable in the formulation. Classic example is vitamin C, right? Vitamin C, once you, you know, take the crystalline material and dissolve it into water, it is extremely unstable. able. So as cosmetic chemists, we're trying to figure out ways to, you know, not just put vitamin C in the formula, but ensure that it is last through the shelf life formula, and then it gets to where it needs to within the skin. And those things aren't always, you know, readily obvious from the, from the label, I think to a consumer, but a company might talk about, you know, the stability of their vitamin c or how they've delivered it you know if they're using maybe liposomes or or some other way to help deliver that ingredient that makes sense yeah that i was gonna ask you about those too because there's a lot of buzz around like exosomes liposomes you know all of these delivery you know mechanisms that are coming out now and i'm i'm on the fence you know the biologist and the physiologist in me is still kind of like looking at it side-eyed but you know I understand that we have to you know innovate and come up with new new ideas on how to get these things to where they need to go but also I wanted to ask you because you brought this up what is like truly like for us normal consumers what do we really need to understand about the stability of formulations like I know that you mentioned vitamin c and that's a huge one you You know, I think a lot of people kind of saw vitamin C's instability demonstrated, you know, oftentimes on social media and through posts.

17:22But like when we're considering the overall stability of any formulation that contains any form of active ingredient, any type of antioxidant, what do you think is like the true determining factor of that stability from a chemistry standpoint? Sure. So when we develop products, we do have a stability protocol where we evaluate that product in what we call accelerated stability conditions. And we're exposing the product to heat. And the assumption there is, if I go back to my chemistry days, the Arrhenius equation, that if I input heat into my reaction, it's going to accelerate that reaction. So we're stress testing the formulas in advance to look at the stability of those ingredients.

18:16And we typically target a two to three year shelf life for products because it can get really hard to try and extrapolate beyond that when you're, because you don't know how a consumer is going to store a product, right? We hope that everyone takes care of their products and keeps them in a cool place. But we know that a lot of consumers keep them in their bathroom, which is humid and warm. But we look at also things like microbial degradation, because not only could the ingredient itself, usually heat and light are two drivers of instability, but you can also have microbial degradation of a product.

18:57So we have to add preservatives to the product as well, because many cosmetic ingredients are food for bacteria. So we have to ensure that those bacteria don't grow in a product and further degrade the ingredients. So we're looking at multiple ways of protecting a product over the shelf life. And that also includes selecting the right packaging. If I have a very susceptible ingredient like vitamin C, I want to put it in an opaque package. Ideally, I want to put it in a package, maybe with an airless pump so that it's not going to be exposed to more oxygen and further oxidize. So there are all these different multiple touch points in formula development that we're looking at to preserve the efficacy of those ingredients.

19:46And that can also include throughout the stability testing for those ingredients to show that it is still there from the day we make the batch to the end of that stability test. hmm yeah that makes sense that makes a lot of sense I mean I figured there's a lot that goes into it I just you know wonder because for example like with shelf life you know I'm always curious like how long we should be you know utilizing the same serum or the same moisturizer because I know many of us out here we don't I mean I don't know how many times I get through a you know one thing of moisturizer I usually switch things up pretty quickly but you know I'll have something sitting on my shelf for you know a while and I'll come back to it later or something like that so does it matter like I mean I know you mentioned the airless container for like you know something like vitamin c or but but does it matter overall in a formulation like if we open it and then we store it you know or can we wait the two to three years so what I love and it's it's not part of the United States, you know, regulatory environment, but in the European Union, they put something on the product called a period after opening date.

21:01And so if a company sells their product globally, they typically still have it on US packaging as well, but it looks like a little jar with the lid open and it will have a, you know, a number in there like 3M or 12M, you know, and that tells you how many months after opening that you should hold on to the package. And I think that's a really good, you know, if your product does have that period after opening symbol on it to follow that, because that is, you know, based on whatever internal testing the company has done to prove out stability. And, you know, especially anything you're using around the eye area too, you want to be really careful about, you know, continuing to hold on to a product too long because, you know, your eyes of mucous membrane, it doesn't have, you know, the protective, you know, we've got our stratum corneum that's really impenetrable on, you know, on our bodies, but the eye is really a mucous membrane and it's really sensitive.

22:05So you have to be extremely careful with anything around the eye area. That makes sense. That makes a lot of sense. Yeah. I've seen that little container looking symbol on a lot of these yeah i wish it was a part of the the u.s you know regulations here but i think it's global companies do use it on on packaging so if you if you see it it's a really great guide yeah that's i like that thing too so i'm i hope everyone's looking for it you know when you're shopping for products because that helps a lot it does help so no i'm curious because I mean in terms of chemistry like I think there's a lot of things that are up and coming I mean you had mentioned a little bit you know hinted at like for example liposomes but what excites you the most on in the you know cosmetic chemistry realm right now like what are things that are really you know cutting edge right now in terms of whether it's technology or an approach that you're excited to see in relation to beauty sure one of the things I'm most excited about is biotechnology being used to develop ingredients.

23:12And I think it really gets to some of the sustainability issues with ingredients that are of natural origin. And I think it also gets to ways to create more pure sources of these ingredients as well. You're not having to extract them and then purify them from a plant or something like that. it's really impressive the ingredients that they're they're creating through these these processes where they they take microorganisms and they basically program them to to make these ingredients and you know example of you know some interesting things i've seen done they're looking at ways of creating colorants that have been you know historically sourced from the carmine that is from the beetle.

24:07You know, I've seen people looking to make similarly brilliant pigments derived from fungi. And it's, to me, there's such a benefit to being able to have a more sustainable source to some of these materials. And they're also looking to make materials that are really, you know, hard to extract from nature, because you can only get very small quantities making an ingredient extremely expensive and therefore hard to use in sufficient quantities in some cosmetics. So you see, sometimes if you see an ingredient, it's really low on the ingredient statement. You have to question if it's in an efficacious level and they're not always incredibly affordable, but if we can make these ingredients in a way that's more affordable and more sustainable that's really impressive to me and the technology is just it's fascinating yeah that sounds really cool i like that you brought up the dyes because it's always been a huge pet peeve of mine when people have these like crazy artificial dyes you know i mean that's just polluting our oceans at the end of the day so it's it's cool to see that we are coming up with more natural ways to figure this pigment situation out because i mean that's i think that's it should be a given you know that should fall on the shoulders of a brand that kind of responsibility you know when it comes to the sustainable aspect because there's a lot of options out there but if you're choosing to just be ignorant about it you know as a brand it just I don't find that excusable as a consumer and and colors are colors are a whole interesting area of cosmetic regulation that I could talk about for for hours is really fascinating but I think it's an area that is it's ripe for innovation in the industry yeah no it's definitely interesting you know to say the least but I'm also I'm very curious about you know when you're so basically like when a brand is coming up with like you know say a formulation and they are saying okay I don't like this and I need to make it again they call it iterations right like different iterations what does that mean for the cosmetic chemist like do you have to start from scratch or do you just like like I mean how long does that process take because I've heard a lot of brands like boast about this like oh we went through 60 iterations of this one formula and I'm just like well what does that mean does that mean you changed one ingredient or you know does it mean you completely redid everything you know so what are your thoughts on that like when people make claims like this you know and and what does it really mean i think product development should go through through iterations because you know to to nail it on the first try is is generally you know that would be really amazing but you know when we're trying to translate aesthetics into a formula that can that can take time to you know because the way i talk about something thing and how something feels to me might be very different to to someone else so we're we try to quantify all of these these things when we talk about a formula and we we try to calibrate ourselves in ways that we can say like okay this is you know sticky or this is oily or this feels luxurious you know because what what does luxurious mean to you or or me you know that that can be you know sticky is a little bit easier.

27:44So you're often going to go through multiple iterations of a formula because also you might, what we do when we develop formulas too, is we don't just test it on ourselves, right? Because I'm going to have a bias to my formula. I really love it, of course, but I want to give it to a group of target consumers and get their opinion. They might notice something that I didn't, right? So we want to get as many opinions on it as possible as we're working through the process and go through those iterations to work out some of those kinks. Because when you're putting together 15, 30 different ingredients, something unexpected might happen.

28:28And we're always trying to, of course, work out, you know, in our recipe, for lack of a better word, as we develop the formula, we're trying to work out all of these factors at the beginning, but we're going to have to do some work to refine. And, you know, think about it as cooking, right? If you try a new recipe that you've never tried before, the first time you make it, even though you're trying to follow that recipe as closely as possible your spices might be like is you might have a different type of curry than they use in their recipe and it might come out a little bit different so there's going to be some refinement that needs done and you know you want to to keep refining as much as possible uh to get to the ideal product so you know it takes whatever it takes right to get to that end end product but I do see a lot of companies talking about how long they've spent on product development.

29:32And I think it's really important in today's market as well to spend that time as well as money on research and development, because there's a lot of dupe culture, right? A lot of copying formulas. And if you don't have a truly differentiated price, that's what I was thinking in my head there if you don't have a differentiated product price might be your differentiator you might be able to try to figure out a way to make it cheaper but I don't know that's really where you want to always be competing right so I think you you need to spend the time and the effort on on the science to develop a truly differentiated and efficacious product and you know I think that's something important to really think about when you're, you know, deciding to put together a project to develop a cosmetic.

30:31Absolutely. I love that you said that. I completely agree. I think that, you know, I've said it many times. I feel like I say it every episode. Anyone who's listening to all of our episodes is probably sick of me saying this, but I always say we have a lot of packaging in this industry, you know, and there's a lot of like people who are overcharging for packaging, I feel like because when you look at a lot of formulations, I hinted at this earlier when we were talking, Kelly, and it was when I use a formula and it's pretty much the same, you know, and it's like, I know it's the same because I looked into it, you know, like, I know it's like, you can call it a dupe or you can call it just, you know, another formula that's pretty much exactly like the other one.

31:12The only differentiating factor that I see between the$80 bottle and the$12 bottle is the packaging. And so it becomes really important. Like you said, I mean, the science has to come first because at the end of the day, when I think about skincare, I'm noticing more and more now, more than ever, I think that the skincare consumer is becoming a lot more science literate in the sense of like people understand what these words mean. They understand what the, you know, we talked about ingredients before ingredients or even just like claims like they're starting to really become educated around these topics.

31:51And so like now more than ever, I feel like science has to take the lead, you know, and to not put it at the front and center of a brand. For me, it just doesn't seem I don't know. It seems abnormal to not do that, you know, especially with something like skin health. like I think cosmetics like beauty and like you know like color cosmetics is a different it's a different conversation you know when it comes to that but especially with skincare science has to be at the front and center because it's an organ you're you're literally treating an organ at the end of the day and I'm you know I could talk about this for hours I you know skin is is the biggest you know largest organ in your body and it it does so many things for us and I think it really you know that really means you do need to to take time and take care of it you know it's our it's our barrier against the outside world and it it protects us from uv exposure it protects us from you know microorganisms getting in it's you know it's just it makes vitamin d for us it's just such an amazing amazing biological system yeah absolutely i completely agree and you know one of the questions it's a really big question actually and I want to get your opinion on this is this idea so we have a lot of terminologies as you know in the you know beauty industry there's clean beauty there's natural beauty organic beauty you know I don't know homemade beauty there's everything you know and I really always find myself at this juncture where I get can get behind a lot of the sentiments of clean beauty I really can and even like natural and organic all these words i can get behind the sentiment of consumers wanting things that are genuinely good for them you know if they put them on their skin they know it's not going to lead to some sort of like you know exposure to like chemicals that don't need to be on their skin i guess you know i don't know how else to phrase that but what are your thoughts around all of these words when it comes to the perspective of purely looking at it from a chemistry perspective i mean does it even matter if we label things like that?

34:06Or, I mean, is there value there from a scientific standpoint? I think, unfortunately, you know, I think clean beauty came from a, came from a good place, right? Like a place of concern about ingredients and product safety. But I think clean beauty has been, it's, it's misguided and it's, it's, it's become, you know, a marketing kind of a marketing vehicle that is, is meant to, you know, differentiate a product, one product is safer or another, same thing with natural, you know, and when I look at it from the perspective of a chemist, you know, I think any toxicologist would agree, agree with me as well.

34:49we go back to looking at the ingredients and it's about how you're exposed to the ingredients and how much you're exposed to. And so it's not, you know, I think clean beauty likes to put ingredients in terms of good and bad. And that's, that's not necessarily the case. And, you know, good example are our preservatives. You know, clean beauty is kind of really hung on to some bad information about particular sets of preservatives. And then those preservatives have been removed from our list of materials that we can use as chemists because a lot of brands today want to formulate to these clean beauty standards.

35:36But those preservatives have a long history of safe use. If you look at, there's an organization called the Cosmetic Ingredient Review, and it is a panel of toxicologists and medical professional scientists that review all of the existing data about ingredients and their safety. And then they issue an opinion on it. And there's a similar organization in the European Union called the SCCS that will do a similar assessment of ingredients. They're a little broader in their reach. they cover all consumer products. But if you look at the opinions on particular preservatives from these groups, they will note that they're safe as currently used in cosmetics.

36:21However, then we have clean beauty lists that remove these from our toolbox of things we can use to prevent microbial contamination. And microbial contamination is a serious concern for cosmetic products because you You can, you know, not only can it, you know, impact the shelf life of the product and the integrity of the product, but it can cause, you know, in compromised individuals can cause infections or specifically eye area infections. So we need to be able to preserve products to make those products safe for the consumer. And it's not just, you know, that we, you know, just put preservatives in products because we want to increase their shelf life.

37:06It's also that it's a regulatory requirement. So the United States FDA requires that we put safe products on the market and that they not be contaminated with harmful microorganisms. And it's the same thing in every country around the world. So preservatives are an important part of cosmetic formulation, but I think clean beauty has really unfortunately done a disservice in putting more products out there that maybe aren't adequately preserved. And you can see this with the number of recalls for microbial contamination that the FDA publishes. Yeah. Yeah. No, that's a really good point. And speaking of preservatives, I was going to ask you, what are some of, I think the most tried and true preservatives that you think are out there right now in the cosmetic space that you think we should look for on ingredients lists, you know, and feel safe about.

38:04Well, I think, you know, historically parabens have been fantastic preservatives because you can use them at very low levels and, you know, they're very effective, a broad range of microorganisms. However, they've kind of been removed from our toolkit. So you rarely see them anymore in cosmetic products. But when we're looking at today's kind of toolkit of preservative ingredients, you'll see things like organic acids. So you might see sodium benzoate on the label or potassium sorbate. These need to be converted into their acid form. So benzoic acid and sorbic acid in formulation. And that requires that these products be low pH.

38:51So this method doesn't work for all types of products. They need to probably be somewhere around pH 4 or less for these types of preservatives to be really effective. Phenoxyethanol is another common one that you see today that is quite effective, but it also brings along with it, it smells a little bit like roses. So again, might not be ideal for every type of product. And then, you know, we still have some preservative, what we call adjuncts that we use in formulas and these are they themselves are not exactly preservatives um so they're not you know on their own they don't work so well but they are they're chelants that are helping take out some of not only some of the metal ions that might give give you like soap scum for in hard water but they're also chelating some of the metal ions that might be in a bacterial membrane to help the preservative work better so things like you'll see edta on the label yeah no i know what you mean that that makes sense and i i'm sad to see that they've like demonized so many of them you know because like honestly at the end of the day like i know we talk a lot about you know skin care stays on your face or your body and it like a lot of people will say things like yeah you know it's into your bloodstream and i'm like you know how long it takes for that to happen look you know and and I think you know if you're you know in the field of cosmetic chemists we know that getting an ingredient to penetrate can be really hard because that's you know we're we're often trying to figure out how we can make our products more efficacious by getting particular ingredients to where they need to be in the skin and we know that it the skin is a really great barrier it's not that easy to penetrate exactly I mean I've had products before that clean they claim to be clean and there's literally mold or like some sort of like you know some sort of growth in them as soon as I'm like I open them or within a week or so and I'm just like this is more harmful not only am I not going to put this on my skin but just to have it in my house and you know deal with like inhaling spores and like you know there's so many things that go along with that if you have overgrowth of a microorganism in a formula that's or you know in anything that's supposed to help it grow like you're harming yourself in multiple ways you know that's now you need to worry about many organ systems not just your skin so yeah it's it's kind of like it always baffles me too because I feel like for some reason the beauty space as advanced as we are in the sense of like we want the best technologies we want to keep pushing forward there's a lot of like regressive type of thinking that i see here you know what i mean because it's like it to me it doesn't make sense that someone made a lipstick in their kitchen and you're not putting that on the one of the most sensitive areas of your like the skin you know your face like your lips are very very you know the skin is very thin on your lips and now you're putting something on there that is not really tested for things like microbial overgrowth or even just the concentrations of what was put in there you know to create the color or the the you know the feel of the lipstick or whatever and that really worries me that consumers buy into that kind of stuff because it it doesn't make sense you know like it's like what what are you doing i think we've come a long way in terms of you know society and and development of these consumer products and you know i've seen videos of people on tiktok making homemade sunscreen or you know and we we now know how complicated it is to make a good sunscreen and you know it is even a you know it's a challenge to get the, you know, titanium dioxide or zinc oxide dispersed into a sunscreen product.