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Why Do We Get Wrinkles and What Actually Causes Them? · So That's Why

• 0:04
  Jen: Welcome to the So That's Why podcast, where we unpack the
• 0:07
  science behind everyday questions.
• 0:09
  I'm Jen.
• 0:10
  Chris: I'm Chris.
• 0:11
  Matt: And I'm Matt.
• 0:12
  Jen: Okay, so here's a question for you.
• 0:14
  When you spot a new line on your face in the mirror, what do you blame?
• 0:20
  Um, I mean, it's not something I experience, but hey.
• 0:22
  Matt: Obviously.
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  Jen: Nearly all of us, though, we will blame aging, but the science
• 0:31
  says the calendar is mostly innocent.
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  So why do we get wrinkles?
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  Matt: Y- hang on, so the calendar is mostly innocent.
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  Jen: Mm-hmm.
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  Matt: You can't just say that and then carry on.
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  I've spent my whole life assuming wrinkles are time doing its thing,
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  or maybe stress caused by the kids.
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  I don't know.
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  Chris: Well, Father Time does play a part, it's fair to say.
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  Uh, but when researchers try and pin down what actually causes the lines
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  we see on our face, the biggest single factor isn't birthdays at all, um, it's
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  sunlight, with estimates putting at least 80% of visible aging, uh, that we
• 1:09
  see on our faces down to sun exposure.
• 1:12
  Jen: Which actually means then that most of what we treat as inevitable is
• 1:17
  something happening to your skin, not just something ticking away inside.
• 1:23
  Matt: So you're telling me then, the thing that I've been passing off as just getting
• 1:27
  older, uh, is mostly the sun exposure with no cream on, convinced I was, you
• 1:32
  know, tanning or Captain Invincible.
• 1:34
  Chris: Mm. Well, looking like a spring chicken as you do, Matt, you clearly got
• 1:37
  away- … with all of that sun exposure.
• 1:39
  Matt: Oh, you smooth talker.
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  Chris: Um I know.
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  Uh, but yes, some of those hideous tanning rituals that people had back in the '80s
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  and '90s, they've got a lot to answer for when it comes to premature aging.
• 1:51
  Jen: Okay, before we get into the how, it's worth knowing, like, the speed
• 1:56
  of the process, because it's actually a slower process than people picture.
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  So from your late 20s, your skin's collagen, which is the main structural
• 2:05
  protein, that starts dropping by around one to 1.5% a year.
• 2:11
  Matt: It doesn't sound like a whole great deal though, does it, one to 1.5% a year?
• 2:14
  Jen: Mm.
• 2:15
  Chris: It doesn't when you look at it in a singular way, but that's one year.
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  Uh, but of course it compounds, so if you're shedding a percent or
• 2:22
  so annually over, like, 30 years, that's a huge share of your collagen
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  that you're losing in that time.
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  Jen: Yeah, and that's just the slow background hum that happens to
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  everyone, you know, whatever they do.
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  But the reason, like, two people the same age can look a decade apart is mostly down
• 2:40
  to what's been layered on top of that hum.
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  Matt: So I reckon then some people will feel a little called out here.
• 2:47
  Um, uh, maybe me.
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  I… Lots of people think a fortnight frying on the beach counts as self-care.
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  Jen: Mm.
• 2:53
  Chris: Yep.
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  I'd say that applies to a large percentage of people.
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  And let's be honest, there are benefits of, of going in the sun ain't th- And
• 2:58
  chilling out on holiday, but, um- Yeah,
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  Jen: definitely
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  … Chris: yeah, you gotta put the captain sensible bit on-
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  and be careful.
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  Um, but the, the good news, which we'll get into, is that the biggest
• 3:08
  lever in all of this is actually the easiest one to put right.
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  Jen: We love, we love stuff like that, don't we?
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  Matt: We do, Jen, we do.
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  Absolutely.
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  Jen: Okay, so let's go under the surface of the skin because this is where
• 3:22
  it gets scientifically satisfying.
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  Matt: Love that phrase.
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  Chris: There's no
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  Jen: better satisfaction- Probably not one you've ever said before-
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  … Matt: but hey.
• 3:30
  Scientifically
• 3:31
  Jen: satisfying.
• 3:31
  Okay.
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  So wrinkles don't form in the bit of the skin that you see.
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  They form in the layer beneath that, the dermis.
• 3:40
  Matt: So the visible crease, uh, is what I see, but the real
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  action is, uh, a layer down.
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  So what's actually going on there?
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  Chris: Yeah, so there are three things mainly, and it's probably
• 3:50
  worth naming them properly.
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  So as Jen mentioned, we've got collagen, which is the, the protein that gives
• 3:56
  skin its firmness and tensile strength.
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  It's almost like the kinda scaffolding that holds the skin up.
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  Then we have elastin, th- another well-known protein, and this is a separate
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  protein that lets skin kind of stretch and spring back, hence the elastic part- Mm
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  of the elastin name.
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  And another one that's well-known is hyaluronic acid, and this
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  is a molecule that holds water together into the cells and keeps
• 4:19
  the whole lay- skin layers plump.
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  Jen: So in young skin, like ours, Those three are, like, dense, organized,
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  and they're constantly renewed.
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  So collagen is the one, like you said, doing most of the structural
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  work, and it's actually the most abundant protein in the whole body.
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  Matt: Okay, so firmness, stretch, and plumpness, which is a great word,
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  plumpness- … um, are three separate jobs with three separate molecules
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  Chris: Yep, and what makes and maintains all three is a single
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  kind of cell called the fibroblast-
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  Jen: Sounds tough, that, doesn't it?
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  Chris: It does.
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  I mean-
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  Jen: Fibroblast.
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  I,
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  Chris: I don't know, it sounds a bit like a film, but Fibroblast 2-
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  The Skin's Revenge.
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  Um, again, I've lost my train of thought.
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  Um, so- That's unlike you … in young skin, fibroblasts are productive, and
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  what they're doing is they're laying down fresh collagen and elastin about
• 5:13
  as fast as the old stuff is wearing out.
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  Jen: So two things change that as we age, and this is, like,
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  at the heart of it really.
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  So first is a growing share of fibroblasts, they become senescent, which
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  means they largely, like, stop producing.
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  They don't clear away, and they start giving off low-level inflammatory signals
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  that degrade the tissue around them.
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  I bet you've never said senescent before, have you?
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  Matt: I was just thinking, it's just a word that I've not used.
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  Senescent.
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  Jen: Put that on your Scrabble list.
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  Matt: I've said this before on previous episodes, I'm not
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  playing Scrabble with you two-
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  you cheat.
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  Um, so the cells then that are meant to be maintaining the place sort
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  of zone out, and then they seem to do a bit of harm on the way.
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  Jen: Mm.
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  Chris: They do, and then the second change is, um, a family of enzymes called MMPs.
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  Matt: Military police?
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  Jen: MPs? No, MMPs?
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  Chris: I was, yeah, I was gonna try and get away with this one.
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  MMPs are matrix metalloproteinases.
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  But, but we'll call them- Bless you … MMPs for short, okay?
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  Um, and the, the normal job of MMPs is useful because they clear
• 6:19
  out worn collagen so that fresh collagen can replace it, and in
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  young skin, their activity is held in careful balance, but it's fair
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  to say it's not the case as we age.
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  Matt: Mm.
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  Jen: So I'll give something for the fact fans.
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  Chris: Yes.
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  Jen: I did my PhD in snake venoms, and actually, a lot of snake venoms contain
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  metalloproteinases, and when they get the, you know, a snake bites and the
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  metalloproteinases get injected into the skin, they wreak havoc 'cause they
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  just degrade everything, so you end up with, like, massive swelling, bleeding.
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  Awful
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  Matt: Awful
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  Jen: Give you all that one for free.
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  Matt: Thanks for that.
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  Jen: So we- Dr. Jen.
• 6:57
  Yeah.
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  To prove that I am a real doctor.
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  Not a fake one as people think.
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  So yeah, so with age, the balance of, um, what you talked about, Chris, that
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  tips, so the MMP activity, it climbs, and that is often, like, switched on by
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  the sun and by inflammation, so while new collagen production slows, um, so
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  breakdown starts to outpace repair.
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  Matt: So the skin suddenly doesn't fail then, uh, it just loses,
• 7:32
  uh, that repair, doesn't it?
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  It, it, it doesn't, it doesn't work, so the one-sentence version being what?
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  I don't know, collagen comes apart faster than the body can put it back together?
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  Jen: Mm.
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  Chris: That's it almost word for word.
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  You're a biologist.
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  Woo-hoo.
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  We, we knew it.
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  Matt: I'm getting so smart doing these podcasts.
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  He's a
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  Chris: graduate now.
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  Absolutely.
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  Um, so collagen and elastin get broken down and disorganized faster than the
• 7:53
  fibroblasts rebuild them, as Matt, you were saying very eloquently.
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  Yeah, yeah, yeah.
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  And as a result, the dermis thins and loses its spring, and the
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  surface above, which is no longer fully supported, settles into these
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  kind of fine lines and wrinkles and
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  Jen: crinkles.
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  It sounds very gentle, that, doesn't it?
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  Settles into lines.
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  Chris: It
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  Jen: does.
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  Doesn't look quite as gentle on your face, but hey.
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  Chris: No, I hope the, uh, the filters are good on these cameras.
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  The soft effect filter.
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  Jen: So we mentioned sunlight before, and this is where it comes in,
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  because it dries the same imbalance, but harder than anything else does.
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  Matt: So go on then, because I still can't picture really how
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  sunshine reaches a whole layer down and does structural damage.
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  Jen: Mm.
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  Chris: Yeah, so when ultraviolet light hits the skin, it generates
• 8:41
  a burst of unstable molecules that are called free radicals.
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  Matt: Great band name.
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  Jen: Yeah.
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  Is a great band name.
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  The Free Radicals.
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  Chris: Yeah.
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  Matt: Ooh.
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  I was thinking Unstable Molecules.
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  That's a great band name.
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  That, that's, that's
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  Chris: the album name, The Free Radicals.
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  You know, the, the tricky second album.
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  Yeah.
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  You know, the Unstable Molecules.
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  I
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  Jen: feel like we need to do this as a side hustle.
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  Matt: I, you don't want me in a band.
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  Not if you want people to listen to it, that's all I'm saying.
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  Chris: So anyway, when these free radicals form, within minutes they
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  switch on these MMPs, the very enzymes that break collagen down.
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  So each unprotected sunny hour is a small spike of collagen loss.
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  Jen: And it does a second thing at the same time, so it quietens the signal that
• 9:27
  tells fibroblasts to make new collagen.
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  So the sun speeds up the breakdown and slows the repair in, like, one
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  move, which is why it accounts for so much of what we see on the skin.
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  Matt: Yeah.
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  So the sun isn't aging our skin in some vague way, it seems to be
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  driving the two exact processes you've both just described- Mm … at both
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  ends, which kind of makes it feel, I guess, less like fate and something
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  that we can actually deal with.
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  Jen: Mm.
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  Chris: Yeah, that's it, and of course it's cumulative, so no single afternoon
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  matters much, but the damage banks up over decades, which is why heavily
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  sun-worn skin looks the way it looks.
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  Jen: And this is probably a good moment to say that not all wrinkles
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  are the same, because it explains why one fix never works for everything.
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  Matt: I did wonder about that, actually.
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  The lines on my forehead feel like a different thing from the ones
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  maybe starting around my eyes.
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  Chris: Yeah, and, and they really are.
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  So some are what we call dynamic wrinkles, so they're made by muscles folding the
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  skin every time you frown or smile, whereas others are static, so from a
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  s- they're from a structural loss that we've been describing, and they sit
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  there even when your face is still.
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  Jen: And then there are sleep wrinkles, which are almost funny, so- But, you
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  know, if you press your face into a pillow the same way for seven hours a night for
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  years, those creases can eventually set.
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  Matt: Yeah, so the pillow crease that usually fades by 11:00 in the
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  morning, given enough time, will become permanent on my face, which is,
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  if I'm honest, not great if you see my face first thing in the morning.
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  Chris: Mm-hmm.
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  I think you do yourself an injustice.
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  I thought your camera filter really is quite good.
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  Matt: Let's go with that.
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  Chris: Now, as always, there's, um, there's real individual variation on top
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  of all of this, so how much protective pigment your skin makes is largely
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  down to genetics, but that protective pigment strongly affects how much
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  UV gets through and does the damage.
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  Jen: And hormones matter enormously, too.
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  So around menopause, when estrogen falls, women can lose up to about
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  30% of their skin's collagen in roughly the first five years.
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  Matt: 30%, that's not 1% a year.
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  That's a proper drop rate.
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  Jen: I know.
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  Chris: It really is, and it isn't talked about n- anywhere nearly enough, is it?
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  Um, because by the age of 50, you can have lost nearly 50% of your collagen.
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  And of course, as we just mentioned, a lot of it's accelerated during that,
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  that kind of the early menopausal years.
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  Um, and with- when it comes to estrogen, it directly supports collagen
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  production, so when that estrogen falls away, a lot of that structural change
• 12:08
  arrives in that very short, small window, which is just not fair, is it?
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  Jen: No, it's really not.
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  And while we're talking about the popular stuff- Yeah … like
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  menopause, can we talk about the thing that half the internet is currently
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  drinking, collagen supplements?
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  Matt: Dun, dun, dun.
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  I was hoping you'd get to those because I'm betting there's a
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  whole bunch of people with tubs of this stuff in their cupboards
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  in houses up and down the country.
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  So give it to us straight, guys.
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  Chris: Yeah.
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  So let's be fair to the, the kind of evidence out there, or lack of.
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  Um, so for the kind of pre-made kinds that you swallow or, you know, the
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  collagen drinks, a recent pooled analysis of 23, like, peer-reviewed, um, trials
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  showed that the strongest independent studies don't actually show a clear
• 12:56
  effect on wrinkles or elasticity.
• 12:58
  Jen: And the reason, though, it's less damning than it sounds.
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  Your gut can't absorb collagen whole, so it breaks it down into amino acids first.
• 13:08
  So r- you're really just taking in the building blocks the long way around.
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  Matt: So it's less drink collagen, build collagen, and more drink
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  collagen, break it into pieces-
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  and let your body decide what to build.
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  Jen: Mm.
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  Chris: Yeah, and an important point here is that collagen is
• 13:24
  not always actually collagen.
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  So when we talk about collagen drinks or supplements, they're usually or
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  almost always hydrolyzed collagen, and that's because, as we mentioned,
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  h- um, collagen itself can't be absorbed, so the hydrolysis breaks
• 13:37
  that collagen down into its amino acid components, which can be absorbed.
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  So i- it's really important to understand what a collagen supplement actually is.
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  Mm. Um, now we've taken this thinking into the volagen formula that we've
• 13:50
  developed, which it does the same thing.
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  So we've got the amino acid components of collagen in the same structure and ratio,
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  which is the same as hydrolyzed collagen.
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  Um, just we do it from a plant source, not an animal source.
• 14:03
  Sorry for the little plug, but, you know, we've put a lot of research into it.
• 14:06
  Jen: Yeah.
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  Matt: Plug away.
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  Jen: We- and there's a, you know, the fair caveat is that raw materials are only ever
• 14:14
  part of it because the bigger lever is slowing the breakdown in the first place.
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  Matt: Yeah, so the building blocks are worth having, aren't they?
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  They're not just the whole thing.
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  So what's the stuff then with really solid evidence?
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  Jen: And here's where there's genuinely good news because- Yay … the
• 14:33
  single most effective anti-aging step is almost boringly simple.
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  Matt: Boringly simple.
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  Don't tell me it costs a fortune because the skincare aisle is
• 14:44
  already full of these psychological experiments at this point, isn't it?
• 14:47
  Mm-hmm.
• 14:48
  Chris: It's the opposite.
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  Um, the best solution is a good daily decent SPF broad-spectrum sunscreen.
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  Um, so there's a well-known controlled trial where people using such a sunscreen
• 15:01
  every day showed no measurable increase in skin aging over four years, whereas
• 15:06
  the comparison group which didn't apply the same sunscreen aged visibly.
• 15:11
  Matt: So the cheapest and most ignored bottle in the shop beats the 40 quid
• 15:15
  miracle serum sitting right next to it, which is, like, g- for me it's
• 15:19
  great news if you're paying, right?
• 15:20
  Chris: Like, 40 quid, that's- that's a bit, uh, generous, isn't it?
• 15:22
  That's cheap, isn't it?
• 15:22
  Yeah.
• 15:22
  80, 100 pounds thereabouts.
• 15:25
  Jen: Yeah, that really is the headline, and it's never too late
• 15:29
  to start because you're always preventing the next decade of damage
• 15:33
  even if you can't undo the last one.
• 15:36
  Chris: Yeah, and I think sticking with skincare, 'cause I- I do wanna be
• 15:39
  fair to skincare 'cause there are some good technologies- Mm … out there.
• 15:42
  The next tier down, um, with good evidence behind it is
• 15:47
  retinoids, so vitamin A creams.
• 15:50
  And these are interesting because they d- don't just sit on the surface of the skin.
• 15:53
  What they do or what, if they can be delivered properly, what they're trying
• 15:56
  to do is actually switch collagen-building genes back up in the deeper layers,
• 16:01
  the dermis, dermal layers of the skin.
• 16:03
  Matt: Okay, so a retinoid is actually going down into that layer and turning the
• 16:07
  collagen-making back up, not just kinda smoothing the surface like a polyfiller.
• 16:15
  Jen: It's probably a bit more elegantly than that, yeah.
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  But it's more or less what they do.
• 16:19
  So, um, one other one to mention is topical vitamin C, which has
• 16:24
  got decent evidence too, and that's partly because it's an antioxidant
• 16:29
  against, like, the UV damage.
• 16:31
  Um, and also partly because collagen literally can't form without it.
• 16:36
  Chris: Yeah, vitamin C is amazing on, on so many levels, but it
• 16:40
  really is the collagen king- Okay … when it comes to vitamins.
• 16:43
  Matt: I'm learning lots, guys.
• 16:44
  So what about, uh, the lifestyle stuff?
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  Or is … And I- here you go.
• 16:48
  Here's the bit where you tell me all the fun things are bad again.
• 16:51
  Chris: Well, it's fair to say that not smoking is one of
• 16:54
  the biggest levers, and, um
• 16:56
  but also protecting your sleep, um, because that lets
• 16:59
  your skin repair overnight.
• 17:00
  So for those sleep creases we talked about, position matters most because
• 17:04
  sleeping on your back keeps your face off the pillow altogether.
• 17:07
  Matt: Yeah,
• 17:07
  Jen: but it- Yeah
• 17:07
  … Matt: does increase the snore factor, doesn't
• 17:09
  Jen: it?
• 17:09
  Yeah, my husband would not be thankful if I slept on my back.
• 17:13
  Matt: Okay.
• 17:14
  Well, talking about sleep then, the silk pillowcase that everyone
• 17:17
  seems to be swearing by, does the fabric itself actually do anything?
• 17:20
  Chris: I'd say less than the adverts suggest, if I'm honest,
• 17:22
  which may or may not surprise you.
• 17:24
  Uh, but it's probably fair to say they tug on the skin a little
• 17:27
  less than collagen, and they maybe hold moisture slightly better.
• 17:31
  So it is something low risk to try, but the evidence that it actually
• 17:35
  prevents wrinkles is pretty thin, and I'd say the kind of sleeping position's
• 17:41
  Jen: there's a, there's a, a kind way of framing, um, wrinkles as well,
• 17:46
  which is that some of what we call aging is really just evidence of a
• 17:52
  life with a lot of laughter in it.
• 17:54
  Matt: Yeah, that's me.
• 17:55
  Absolutely.
• 17:55
  I love that.
• 17:56
  My crow's feet aren't structural decline.
• 17:59
  No, no, no.
• 18:00
  They are a memorial of good times I've had.
• 18:02
  Jen: Yeah.
• 18:03
  Chris: No, totally.
• 18:04
  When you speak to people in their 80s and 90s, do you think they
• 18:06
  care about their crow's feet?
• 18:08
  They, they're looking back with amazing memories, so- Yeah.
• 18:10
  Mm. No, good on them.
• 18:11
  So onto treatments that people always ask about, and these are injectables
• 18:17
  and lasers, and this is where I have to be Captain Sensible for a
• 18:21
  moment, which won't surprise you.
• 18:22
  Jen: Go on, Captain Sensible.
• 18:24
  Chris: Yep, I'll take it.
• 18:25
  Someone's gotta wear the hat.
• 18:27
  Um, so very briefly, when it comes to the muscle relaxing injectables, they work
• 18:31
  on the dynamic expression lines, so the ones we talked about that from the kind
• 18:36
  of thin skin, and fillers replace lost volume, and lasers are there to kinda
• 18:41
  coax the skin into making new collagen.
• 18:44
  Now, these things can genuinely work, but this is the Captain Sensible bit, when it
• 18:49
  comes to the invasive treatments, please do consult a qualified practitioner,
• 18:54
  because there are some absolute cowboys out there, and it's far better to do
• 18:58
  it properly than just look for a, a kinda cheap treatment and low price.
• 19:01
  Yeah.
• 19:01
  Jen: Yeah.
• 19:01
  Yeah, I think we've all seen the horror stories, haven't we?
• 19:04
  Matt: We have, and I, I, yeah, I… Let me echo Captain Sensible for a
• 19:09
  brief second, and of course, the big takeaway is that for wrinkles we've
• 19:13
  technically been blaming the wrong thing.
• 19:15
  Jen: Yeah, and that's the twist, isn't it?
• 19:16
  So we look at a wrinkle, we blame the calendar, but the calendar is only
• 19:21
  doing a slow, quiet share of the work.
• 19:24
  Chris: It is, and as we explained, the largest share is sunlight speeding up the
• 19:27
  breakdown of collagen, while the skin's own repair slows, which is why the one
• 19:33
  habit that actually moves the needle f- is protecting your skin from that sun damage.
• 19:39
  Jen: Okay, so why do we get wrinkles?
• 19:42
  Chris: So we get wrinkles because in the deep layer of your skin, the cells that
• 19:46
  make collagen and elastin slow down with age, while the enzymes that break those
• 19:50
  proteins down keep going, and sunlight tips the balance hard towards breakdown.
• 19:56
  The surface, no longer firmly supported from beneath, unfortunately settles
• 20:00
  into lines, wrinkles and crinkles.
• 20:03
  Matt: And the good news is that the biggest cause, uh, is the
• 20:08
  one most within your control.
• 20:10
  The calendar you can't argue with, but the sunscreen is right there, and it's handy.
• 20:16
  Jen: So there you go.
• 20:17
  That is why you get wrinkles.
• 20:20
  That is it for this week.
• 20:21
  Hit subscribe wherever you're watching or listening, because we unpack a new
• 20:26
  everyday question every single week.
• 20:29
  And drop the things that you've always wondered about in the
• 20:32
  comments for us to answer.
• 20:34
  Thanks so much for geeking out with us.
• 20:36
  That's it from me.
• 20:37
  Matt: That's it from me.
• 20:38
  Chris: And that's it from me.
• 20:40
  Jen: Bye for now