What is a peptide?
What are proteins?
By definition, proteins are macromolecules made up of at least 50 amino acids, though most proteins in the human body are much larger, and are required for the structure, function, and regulation of our tissues and organs. So what does all of this have to do with peptides? Think of peptides as mini proteins. If a protein was a puzzle, a peptide would be a single piece of the puzzle.
Peptides can be as short as two amino acids, or as long as 50 amino acids, arranged in any order. Because of this, they can have a multitude of different functions. They can act to stimulate the body into secreting more of a specific protein, they can alter hormone function and even activate or inhibit various biological processes (just to name a few). Though you might not think you know much about peptides, there are many that you have likely heard of before. The commonly known protein insulin, is made up of 2 peptides of one 30 amino acid chain, and one 23 amino acid. Oxytocin, the “love hormone” is another example of a peptide as it is composed of 9 amino acids.
Our Favorite Peptides
As you may know by now, science, peptides, and skin are a few of our favorite things here at OneSkin, and you can always count on us to bring you high impact research going on in this field. Many researchers (and consumers!) have a newfound love of collagen peptides [2]. While early research is promising, science is showing that there is more to it than purchasing the latest flavored collagen peptide powder for your coffee. As we mentioned, a peptide can be any combination of between 2 and 50 amino acids. First off, there are multiple different types of collagen in the human body, each being about 3000 amino acids.
Hint: this means there can be over 1,000,000 different combinations of peptides that are collagen peptides
Since not all peptides are created equal, this means that these peptides might have different effects on our bodies, or potentially no effect at all. This characteristic of peptides becomes applicable when thinking about the new trend of ingestible collagen peptides, typically in the form of collagen peptide supplements.. But, there is still hope! Though there is much research to be done in this area, collagen peptides are still a source of amino acids, which are the building blocks of peptides and proteins, that could be useful for a variety of functions in your body, including the skin.
Look at your current topical skin care products and see if any contain peptides. Bonus if you do some research as to why these peptides are included and what their function is!
Now to our favorite part. What are peptides for skin health and why should we care? Recognizing the promise of peptides, OneSkin years ago set out to find one that had the potential to improve skin health at the molecular level. After screening over 900 peptides, we found OS-01, the first peptide published to reduce the accumulation of senescent cells and target one of the root causes of skin aging. Interested in more OS-01 exclusives? Stay tuned for our future posts where we review some exciting data where OS-01 shows the ability to improve not only your skin health but also your health span in vivo.
Key Takeaways
- As the major building block of life, DNA codes for every protein, such as peptides, in your body.
- Peptides are chains of amino acids thcn stimulate different functions in the body, such as controlling hormone function and inhibiting or accelerating biological processes.
- OneSkin screened almost 1000 peptides searching for one that could improve skin health at the molecular level by reducing the accumulation of senescent cells.
