Cosmax and Harvard team up to explore link between lifestyle, skin disorders, skin microbiome for personalised solutions

The South Korean beauty manufacturing giant and Harvard Medical School's Massachusetts General Hospital with focus on skin conditions such atopic dermatitis, acne and psoriasis.

The research aims to examine how lifestyle factors like diet, outdoor activities, stress, air quality, and sunlight exposure can affect the skin's microbial ecosystem of people who have these skin conditions.

Through this joint project, Cosmax and Harvard aim to provide customised skin care solutions that will consider difference by region, climate, race, and nationality, as well as individual lifestyles and environmental factors.

This project follows Cosmax and Harvard University’s agreement to collaborate on developing cosmeceutical products.

According to the press statement, this research could eventually lead to anti-ageing skin care developments.

“We have high expectations for the positive changes that our joint research with Cosmax will bring to improving people’s skin conditions. We believe that this will allow us to develop new anti-ageing cosmetics,” said Dr. Britton Nicholson, senior vice president of research, Harvard University’s Massachusetts General Hospital.

This research will leverage Massachusetts General Hospital's extensive global bio big data along with years of clinical research gathered from the treatment of patients from over 90 countries.

This vast and diverse amount of data will be complemented by Cosmax's skin microbiome research, which includes around 3,000 microbial species and over 80 patents. The company has also published around 20 papers in SCI-level journals.

Cosmax microbiome projects

Lee Byung-joo, CEO of Cosmax, said this partnership would take its own ‘world-class’ microbiome research capabilities to a new level.

“This joint research will serve as the foundation for creating a new chapter in the biomedical cosmetics field that will lead the future cosmetics industry.” 

In April this year, Cosmax announced that it developed Untopinol, a “steroid alternative” for atopic skin.

The efficacy of Untopinol was proven in human clinical trials conducted on 100 patients with mild to moderate atopic dermatitis.​

In an eight-week clinical trial, 46.2% of patients showed improvement in atopic dermatitis severity (EASI score).

In addition, significant improvements were confirmed in skin moisture content, transepidermal water loss (TEWL) rate, itching score, skin barrier structure, and blood inflammation index.

According to the firm, the ingredient is highly effective with minimal side effects.