Five minutes at Sepawa with …

Barbara M. Obermayer – Head of RAHN-Cosmetic Actives

H&PC: How did 2017 go and what do you see in the future?

Barbara M. Obermayer: We are a global player and we have a very good growth in the international area. We are always introducing one or two new active ingredients. This year for example we introduced an active ingredient, DEFENSIL^®-SOFT, for neurocosmetics.

H&PC: Neurocosmetics? What does it mean exactly?

BMO: DEFENSIL^®-SOFT inhibits TRPV1, a pain receptor, which is located in the skin neurons and keratinocytes. , TRPV1 is an ion channel, which is activated when the skin is irritated by e.g. heat, protons or allergens. DEFENSIL^®-SOFT blocks TRPV1 and in this way it alleviates the the symptoms or irritated, overstressed skin. Furthermore, we are facing very new forms of skin discomfort : TRPV1 is activated by heat stress which can lead to premature skin ageing, so-called thermal ageing. “Laptop thighs”, skin erythema due to the constant exposure to the hot surface of laptoms on the legs, are a very new form of thermal ageing. DEFENSIL^®-SOFTcan help fight it. Speaking of new skin conditions, we have another active ingredient geared at tattoo skin care, LIFTONIN^®-XPERT.

H&PC: Looks like you are at the boundary between pharma and cosmetics.

BMO: Indeed, neurocosmetics sounds more like pharma; however, TRPV1 is present in the epidermis’ keratinocytes and neurons. In this sense, we are still in cosmetics. To develop DEFENSIL^®-SOFT, we screened several compounds and found an inhibitor also naturally present in a mushroom, Albatrellus ovinus, that grows naturally in the forests of Northern Europe or North America. We harvest them in the wild, because it is very difficult to cultivate.

H&PC: Harvesting a wild species could be a sustainability issue.

BMO: Not really, since we are capable to properly harvest them without causing problems to the surrounding environment. We work together with a group of mushroom collectors that usually work for the food industry, and developed harvesting techniques for us.

H&PC: What trends are driving your industry?

BMO: We look at pharma and food and see trends that we can translate into cosmetics. A big rising topic in cosmetics is blue light protection, for example.

H&PC: Do you offer a protection strategy against blue light?

BMO: We are about to launch our “RAHN skin police against blue light”. Adequate protection against UV and HEV radiation should be part of any modern skin care product. Following a screening where we have determined the blue light protection index for several of our active ingredients, we can recommend CELLIGENT^®, MYRAMAZE^® and PROTEOLEA^® which increase the skin’s tolerance against oxidative stress and effectively protect against blue light.

H&PC: What makes RAHN unique?

BMO: We are a small team of dedicated and passionate specialists always trying to give the best service to our customers. Moreover, we are very good in applications: not only promoting active ingredients but also made formulations out of them.