GLUTATHIONE AS A SKIN LIGHTNING AGENT IN COSMETICS

*Pamela Das, Dr. Nibha Bajpai, Pooja Menon

ABSTRACT

Skin lighteners have been in use for ages in Asian countries where fairness is a major goal for every female and now it covered male section also. It is valued by western populations, who expose themselves excessively to the sun and develop sun spots on the skin as a consequence. Therefore this leads them to rely on different skin lighteners to achieve their goals and glutathione is one of them which help people to achieve skin lightening effect in a short period of time which gain popularity amongst celebrities and youtubers. Glutathione is a master antioxidant which is naturally present in human body and it is low molecular weight tripeptide that plays a prominent role in maintaining intracellular redox balance. Glutathione is present in its reduced form and plays an important role in various physiological functions. There is a skin lightening effects result from direct the inhibition of tyrosinase enzyme and switching from eumelanin to phaeomelanin production. This article focuses on the various aspects of glutathione: its metabolism, mechanism of action, its side effects, and the scientific evidence to evaluate its efficacy as skin lightening agent.

Keywords: Glutathione, skin lightening, tyrosinase activity, antioxidant.