THE’tan that we are looking for during the summer can be ruined by theair conditioning What do we use once you return home? The answer is complex and first of all it is good to clarify that There are no specific studies about it. First of all, the air conditioning does not eliminate tanning itself, nor does it directly affect melanin productionwhich takes place in the deepest layer of the skin. From here, it migrates to the outermost layers of the skin, where it accumulates in keratinocytes, dark and limiting the damage of the ultraviolet radiation of the sun’s rays. These are in fact responsible for numerous damage to the cell DNA, contributing to early skin aging and increasing the risk of skin neoplasms, such as the melanoma.
The air conditioning, however, reducing the environmental humidity of our rooms, could contribute to dehydrate the skin and increase the cell turnover (that physiological mechanism with which the skin is released from the outermost layer of cells). This could lead to one Fast loss of superficial skin layerswhere melanin is concentrated, accelerating the disappearance of tan. However, it is only a hypothesis, which needs greater confirmations by the scientific community.
Could air conditioning really influence a process that originates from the deepest point of our epidermis? At first glance the answer may seem obvious: No. Although the synthesis of melanin takes place at the level of melanocytes in the basal layer, the final visual effect of the tan also depends on other factors such as theskin hydration or the mobile turnoveror the biological mechanism with which skin cells die and they are replaced from new cells.
Air conditioning tends to reduce the level of environmental humidity, contributing to dehydration of the skin. A more dry skin appears more extinguished, less bright and, above all, tends to exfoliate itself more quickly: this leads to an acceleration of its turnover, that is, to the rapid desquamation of the most external epidermal layers. The result could therefore be atanning that fades faster: this is thehypothesis Which could explain the perception of those who, after having long exposed to the air conditioning, complains of a “loss of color”.
However, Further studies are needed To better outline the relationship between tanning and air conditioning, bearing in mind that the latter cannot in any way influence the production of Melanin directly.
