Lanolin for Personal Care and Medicine

Wool wax is a natural substance, designed by nature to soften both skin and wool fibres, and to protect them against adverse weather conditions.

The best known uses of refined wool wax products (lanolin and lanolin derivatives) are in medicine, cosmetics and toiletries, which take advantage of these natural protective qualities.

A key ingredient

Lanolin is a key ingredient in some of the world’s most popular cosmetics and pharmaceuticals. Without it, they would not have the emollient qualities that protect and care for our skin and hair.

Emollient properties of lanolin

Stratum corneum

The composition of lanolin resembles the intercellular lipids of the stratum corneum. This is the outermost layer of the skin, which consists of cholesterol, cholesterol derivatives and free fatty acids.

These lipids play a crucial role in the skin’s moisture control. Under normal conditions, water continuously evaporates from the skin's surface.

Insufficient rehydration from lower epidermal layers leads to a dry, inflexible and brittle stratum corneum.

Lanolin is a widely used cosmetics ingredient

Bi-functionality of lanolin

Lanolin owes its outstanding emollient qualities to the fact that in addition to its semi-occlusive capabilities, it is also capable of allowing the bi-directional transportation of water.

Lanolin Alcohol's water absorption capacity makes it an excellent sole emulsifier. Blended at 6 % into a petroleum jelly based ointment more than 200 % water absorption can be reached. Considering petroleum jelly's close to zero water absorption capacity this converts into almost 3.000 % water absorption for the Lanolin Alcohol in this matrix.

Anhydrous lanolin can absorb more than 200% of its weight in water (WW) to form stable water-in-oil (w/o) emulsions. It's also capable of redistributing this moisture to environments of low relative humidity.

In other words, it can both prevent moisture loss and rehydrate. This can be illustrated with a simple experiment.

Glass sheet experiment

By coating a sheet of glass with a thin film of lanolin and dipping it into a container filled with water, the formerly transparent wax layer grows increasingly opaque because of all the water it has absorbed.

When the glass sheet is removed from the container and exposed to the air, the lanolin film gradually becomes transparent again as it releases the water via evaporation and dries out.

Hydrocarbon-based emollients such as Vaseline or petrolatum do not possess this bi-directional water transport ability. Instead they form an almost impermeable occlusive film on the surface of the skin.

Lanolin, as an auxiliary emulsifier, also helps to improve the smooth feel and silky texture of such oil-based systems.

Similarities between lanolin and human skin

Variations of the glass sheet experiment on the stratum corneum of human skin treated with lanolin have shown similar effects.

In addition to the chemical similarity between lanolin and human skin lipids, other physical similarities have been discovered, such as multilamellar structures. These molecular aggregations strongly resemble the liquid crystal structures occurring in skin lipids.

Lanolin-based skin-care products owe their superb emollient properties to the unique chemical and physical characteristics of lanolin.

Lanolin in cosmetics

Natural emollient

Lanolin's beneficial effects on the human skin and hair have been known and valued by humans for thousands of years.

The natural emollient is absorbed by the skin, restoring its correct moisture balance and softness without impairing natural skin functions.

As such, it is an ideal and widely used ingredient for toiletries, personal-care products and medical applications.

Lanolin is also used in lipsticks and eye make-up

Emulsifying properties

Because of the polar nature of its compounds, lanolin has powerful emulsifying properties. This means that it can bind high amounts of water by forming stable emulsions.

By applying it to human skin as a cream or ointment, this moisture is distributed into the intercellular space of the stratum corneum, the outermost skin layer.

To prevent the intercellular water from evaporation, lanolin lipids form a semi-occlusive film on the skin and create a protective barrier.

The regained and stored moisture has a noticeable softening effect on the epidermis, as observed and confirmed by leading laboratories.

Natural all-rounder

The emollient care effects of lanolin and its derivatives are harnessed in a wide range of:

skin creams (such as Nivea® Crème, night creams, cold creams, barrier creams and vanishing creams)
ointments
sunscreen lotions.

However, the complex composition of lanolin makes it a real natural all-rounder.

In soaps it acts as a superfatting agent, minimising dehydration of the skin.
Lanolin oil is used as gloss-enhancing agent in lip glosses.
In lipstick it can function as a crystal inhibitor.
In shampoos and shower gels, as a conditioner.
In hair waxes, as a naturally protective firming component.

Other cosmetic applications

Lanolin is also widely used in:

foundation creams and other skin-cream products as an emulsifier, stabiliser, emollient and skin moisturiser;
oil-based skin lotions and cleansing oils as a skin moisturiser and to control viscosity;
toilet soaps as a superfatting agent, minimising the dehydrating effect of detergents, and to retain perfume;
aftershaves as a skin moisturiser and to control viscosity;
nail polish removers to prevent the defatting of the surrounding skin;
lipsticks and eye make-up as a film modifier and crystal inhibitor, for more uniformly dispersed pigment;
hair dressings and shampoos, as a conditioner against drying, scaling and brittleness of the hair shaft;
hair sprays, as a plasticiser;
hair bleaching agents, as a pH-stable emulsifier.

Lanolin in pharmaceuticals