Croda claims UV hair protection ingredient outshines competitors

Chromaveil has been designed to help reduce UV-induced fading seen in colored hair and protect against the texture changes in virgin (non-colored) provoked by UVB radiation.

According to the company, a number of the competitor ingredients on the market are UV absorbers originally designed to protect the skin and are not substantive.

“This means they don’t stick to the hair so they will be washed down the drain when you rinse off the shampoo,”​ explained Croda’s Cara Eaton.

Chromaveil has been designed to stick to the hair, at least until the next wash, she said.

Shampoo for best formulation opportunities​

The ingredient works particularly well when incorporated into shampoo formulations which Eaton says is down to the fact that it is a quaternium compound.

Most conditioning ingredients are quaternium compounds and are attracted to the negative charge areas on the hair shaft, she explained. The company hypothesizes that when Chromaveil is incorporated into a conditioning formulation there are too many quaternium compounds competing for negative sites, making it less easy to bind to the hair.

Croda tested a Chromaveil-containing shampoo against a non UV protecting control and a competitor product on dyed hair tresses subjected to UV exposure. The company claims that over 90 per cent of panelists identified the Chromaveil tresses as the least faded.

In addition, the Chromaveil-containing shampoo helped protect against UVB damage, according to the company.

Hair tresses subjected to the equivalent of two weeks sun exposure but treated with the Chromaveil-containing shampoo showed almost no loss in hair strength, it claims.

The ingredient is in liquid form with a low (25 percent) solvent content and is stable in low to neutral pH environments, said the company.