What does a Nobel Prize paint developing an anti-aging cream?

[Inkriql]

A couple of years ago, the American writer Froma Harrop, a regular contributor to The New York Times or Harper's Bazaar, put our prejudices to the test with an article on the RealClear political information website entitled "A Nobel for Cosmetic Sciences?" . In his lines, not without a certain irony, he commented: "What a boring world that is not able to imagine that there are advances in a blush ...". Already in November 2019, a morning stained with that gray of postcard with which Paris so often receives us, Bruno Bavouzet, president of LVMH Recherche, the division that encompasses all the scientific research of the French conglomerate, is scrambled into place Listen to such a hypothesis about cosmetics.

"No, no, no ... I feel very proud that my team is able to find relevant findings for basic research. But what we do, interesting as it is, is not going to change the world." Next to him, Dr. Knut Woltjen, right hand of medical researcher Shinya Yamanaka, asserts that he won the Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine in 2012 for his work with stem cells. Woltjen and Bavouzet have just participated in the conference that welcomes the Cell Energy line of Capture Totale, Dior's rejuvenating treatment, devised from the shared study.

The history of this collaboration starts at the Center for Research and Application of iPS Cells (CiRA), in Kyoto (Japan), where Woltjen and Yamanaka (its director) work, and the place to which the research team of the cosmetic firm moved. Bruno Bavouzet relates: "We were developing skin models when we discovered that the stem cells that compose it [few but precious: because despite being only 0.2%, its activation is vital for the good appearance of the dermis] no they have the same energy in someone in their 20s as in their 40s, something we found measuring the respiration of the mitochondria. And it was a surprise, because we thought this type of cell never changed. When we went to tell Professor Yamanaka, he immediately accepted the challenge of trying to understand it together. And in that we are ... "

In addition to sharing basic research, CiRA lends its iPS (induced pluripotency) cell banks, that is, stem cells artificially generated from other cells and end up being able to become that of any type of tissue. "It is a resource that interests us a lot that is managed, because we have them classified by age, from 20 to 70 years, and to better understand each category also opens up new medical routes," notes Professor Woltjen, who sees no conflict in allying with a cosmetic brand, although the law does not require that these products conform to the evidence: "We had a talk at a very high scientific level. And there is a mutual research interest. It is the first time that CiRA collaborates with a European cosmetics company ".

To stimulate the regenerating motor of stem cells in mature skin, Dior has used four floral species in its new line: Madagascar's longoza, Chinese peony, white lily and yellow jasmine. "It's about balancing a reduction in activity. But we don't touch or alter the stem cells, we don't play anything dangerous," says the director of LVMH. In turn, CiRA has opened the door to the first transplant with iPS cells, documented in Nature: ophthalmologist Masayo Takahashi recently confirmed the success of the retinal transplant he performed with this technique two years ago. Its potential is overwhelming and would be a revolution in regenerative medicine, which has just begun. And that is how cosmetics and science intersect, separate, run in parallel and meet again.

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