"7-Mega was shown to improve skin health through the skin wrinkle, skin moisturizing and skin elasticity function improvement effects and the melanin index improvement effect, and had positive safety results, as confirmed through human application tests,” the team of Korean researchers wrote in the journal Nutrients.
The research was funded by Korean ingredient supplier Vitech, which provided the 7-Mega fatty acid supplement used in the study.
Omega-7 for skin health
With age, changes in the skin layers manifest as wrinkles, reduced moisture retention, skin pigmentation and paler coloring.
Previous studies have shown that omega-7—an unsaturated fatty acid (also known as palmitoleic acid) that is found in the lipid bilayer of all human tissue cell membranes that participate in multiple metabolic processes—improves mucosal hydration, skin regeneration, HDL cholesterol levels and insulin sensitivity.
Specific to 7-Mega, the Korean researchers highlighted an in-vitro study on its anti-inflammatory effects on collagen-regenerating human epidermal keratinocyte cells, as well as a clinical study that reported improvements in skin elasticity and wrinkles following supplementation.
However, they said that further research was needed to investigate the effects of 7-Mega on skin ageing.
Study details
The study randomly assigned 101 women between the ages of 40 and 59 to receive either 500 mg of 7-Mega or a placebo, twice daily for 12 weeks.
The primary outcomes were the degree of improvement in wrinkles and moisture filling at the end of the test period compared to baseline. Secondary outcomes included improvement in skin wrinkles; moisture changes at four and eight weeks from baseline; and changes in transdermal water loss, skin elasticity, the melanin index, the erythema index and the Global Photo Damage Score.
"As a result of analyzing the moisture content on both sides, the test group began to show a significant increase after four weeks of intake, and the moisture content after 12 weeks of intake compared to before intake was significantly higher than that of the control group, showing that skin moisture was significantly improved by the intake of 7-Mega," the researchers reported.
After 12 weeks, skin elasticity in the 7-mega group was significantly higher than that of the control group, and melanin analysis confirmed that all values in the test group began to decrease after four weeks. In addition, the change in the erythema index after 12 weeks was significantly lower than that in the control group.
“The study revealed that 7-mega indeed improves skin health through its wrinkle reduction, moisturising and elasticity enhancement, along with a notable improvement in the melanin index," the researchers concluded. "7-mega was effective for human skin function in terms of wrinkles, moisture, elasticity and melanin production and may be useful as a skin nutritional supplement."
Noting limitations including the study's single-center design and the need for safety and efficacy substantiation in younger female populations, the researchers called for follow-up multi-centre and cross-sectional studies on to evaluate 7-Mega's skin health boosting effects.
Journal: Nutrients
doi: doi.org/10.3390/nu16020212
“Anti-Wrinkle and Skin Moisture Efficacy of 7-MEGA: A Randomized, Double-Blind, Placebo Comparative Clinical Trial.”
Authors: Hyun Kyung Sung et al.