The great story of polyphenols
(and Poliphenolia )
Marco Morra
CEO
Poliphenolia srl
The great story of polyphenols
( and Poliphenolia)
Introduction
Poliphenolia does not produce anti-aging creams: Poliphenolia, throughout their products, is an
adventure story telling, in fact, the biggest and most amazing adventure there is, one about nature and
life itself. Poliphenolia is a magnificent journey without an end, that begins with the infinite size of the
sky and the sun, going through the extended landscape scale, of the vineyards, crosses the dimension of
the cluster and its grapes and gets till the scale of immensely small molecules and forces that are at the
basis of life and nature.
Image 1: sun, nature, landscape, grape, on the right animal cells seen through the optical microscope.
They’re the protagonists of this story.
The journey begins again from the immensely small, going through the footpaths that lead the way of
tissues cells, their continuous pulsing and respond to external stimuli, to make us what we are. We want to
talk about this journey, for the pleasure to share so much beauty, to try and have people try the wonder of
nature’s marvels: the one that can be seen, with its magnificent shapes and colors, that requires sensibility
and suggest poetry: but also the one that’s invisible, with its charming story, that starts in the mists of time,
of the bricks that are the basis of our existence and everything around it and that, combining on base of the
universal vision we call Natural law, can build that thing we call life.
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Polyphenols
To live this wonderful journey we are going to need some chemistry, which we’ll use as if we were
describing a painting. The protagonists of this painting are molecules, naturally present in a big part of the
plant world and we’ll see why. This molecules are polyphenols, which Poliphenolia owes its name to.
Poliphenolia deals in particular with the polyphenols contained on grapes which are partly transferred into
wine during vinification (winemaking) and partly remain in the residues of vinification, such as skin and
seeds. Poliphenolia regains this precious molecules from the residues of vinification and uses them to
produce anti-aging creams. Then chemical description says that a typical grape polyphenol is the one
represented below on Image 2, this particular molecule belongs to the flavonoid class. With a bit of
patience, we understand the way that atoms are arranged on the structure, because it’s on this frame, as
we will see, it weaves the extraordinary adventure we talked about. Polyphenol is constituted by what
chemists call “aromatic rings”, meaning the hexagonal structure, where each vertex of the hexagon
corresponds to a carbon atom, that we see highlighted in green and it’s contained twice in this specific
molecule here reported.
Image 2: molecular structure of a typical grape’s polyphenol, a masterpiece of molecular architecture that,
as all molecules, owes its properties and benefits for us to its structure.
In this representation, each carbon atom of the aromatic ring presents a single bond (a slash) or a double
bond (two slash) with the carbon atom near. There is an oxygen atom attached to one or more of the
carbon atoms present in the ring, to which a hydrogen atom is tied to, forming an –OH group called
Hydroxyl. The union of the aromatic ring and the hydroxyl form the structure known as “phenol”, the
structures that contains more Hydroxyl on the same aromatic ring are called Polyphenols. There are endless
variations of this topic in the plant world, depending on how many hydroxyl are tied to the aromatic rings,
where they are positioned, which other groups may be present, which are the structures details (in red)
that, in case there were two rings, it joins them, if possibly that molecule is tied to another one, and a
thousand more variables. Besides two or more molecules like the one in Image 2 can be united, as a train
wagon, forming a bigger structure and opening more variables.
Just as a rough guide, in a red wine bottle there could be near to 3 grams of polyphenol molecules, divided
into more than 100 different species. Leaving our human point of view, because our journey is about to
begin, and getting on the molecule’s point of view, we add up that those 3 grams correspond almost to a
2x1021 molecule, meaning 2 followed by 21 zeros (or two thousand billion molecules, inside that bottle and
only speaking about polyphenols). In other words, in that bottle of only 750 ml there are a lot for our
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standards, in the end Bill Gate’s fortune, that for many of us sure seems immense, its only 76 billion
dollar1.. If we found who would change for us all of Bill Gate’s fortune into 1 dollar bills we would have a
nice little pile, but to obtain the number or polyphenol molecules within a red wine bottle we would still
have to multiply it for over 30 million times. Contrarily, each one of this has a dimensions on the order of
billionths of a meter or less, if we were to take a millimeter we would still have to subdivide it a million
times to get to its typical measures, as for us is the meter. So let’s dive into this unusual dimensions, to
begin with journey you just need to look at Image 2, and ask yourselves what the former chess world
champion Gary Kasparov described as the most important question of all2 : Why? Why that precise
molecule is made that way? Why these molecules are so spread in the plant world? Why this molecule
could ever be good for my wrinkles?
The infinite power of small things.
To answer to these questions why, we should go back to what we call the mist of times, when matter began
to cold and the elements to be formed and combined, the first molecules were being born. All interesting,
new and beautiful, but among them there was one that was destined to make a career and project a bright
future; the water molecule. The formula H2O we all know, simple and clear as water, it contains one of the
most extraordinary means of communication that exists, and that have allowed life and the world to be
formed: a bit of asymmetry. The water molecule, presented in Image 3, seen from a surface has got a V
shape with the oxygen atom which occupies the vertex.
Image 3: water molecule, one of the simplest ones, but…….
The distance between an oxygen atom and the one of hydrogen is a bit less than 0.1 nanometers, which
means a bit less than one ten billionth of a meter. We know that atoms are electrically neutral and their
nucleus is surrounded by electrons. In the water molecule the electrons shared by oxygen and hydrogen
spend statistically more time near the oxygen atom, the bond between oxygen and hydrogen, even if it’s
totally neutral, assumes then a “polar” character; normally; an oxygen atom has a bit more of a negative
charge, while an hydrogen atom has a bit more of a positive charge. Things like these happen in so many
bonds and so many atoms, but being the hydrogen atom the smallest and most simple there is, that little
imbalance of charge distributed on its small volume means a lot, and it’s highly noticed. Since the water
1 http://www.forbes.com/forbes-400/.
2 G. Kasparov, Gli scacchi, la vita, Mondadori, 2007, p. 42
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molecule is so small and simple that little imbalance felt so much by two out of its three components,
makes a difference and determines its properties.
Such a simple molecule with a minor imbalance of charge: seem like nothing, but our life comes out of this3.
In fact, two water molecules that are near to each other cannot be placed as they want to, but preferably
the hydrogen atom of one (with its small surplus of negative charge) will feel attracted by the oxygen atom
of the other molecule, where it will find a nice imbalance towards the negative charge. Something similar
will be done by a third molecule and so on infinitely. Therefor the water molecules have constrains on how
to position, constrains that come from a minor inhomogeneity on the charge distribution, that creates a
force that attracts one mainly positive zone of a molecule to a mainly negative zone of another one. It’s a
power that unites! 4 This minor asymmetry on the distribution or charge, with the forced direction that
similar molecules have to adopt and the intermolecular force that comes with it, had put within the training
matter the bases for a tool of extraordinary growth: now there was an aim, a direction, finally not every
point on the existence of matter was the same, some were imbalanced towards the positive charge and
some towards the negative! To get between two water molecules it was necessary to have a bigger force or
power of the one that oriented the oxygen atom of one to the hydrogen atom of the other one and get on
the right angle.
People often talk about the perfection of the sphere, due to its ineffable isotropy, by not concede the
existence of privileged orientation. If there had been only perfect spheres at the beginning of times, as the
Buridan5 donkey we wouldn’t have known which direction to take to build live. Instead that direction, that
small asymmetry on the water molecule, quoting one who understood liquids and would come millions of
thousand year later, it was the point of support to which the world was about to rise from6.
The molecule of life
Now we could do some building! A structure with high density charge could dispose freely in the water, it
was hydrophilic, and it could be dissolved (salt). A molecule that didn’t present asymmetry or imbalances
that could dialog with those contained in the water, which was all by itself it was hydrophobic (oil). If you
wanted to build a complex structure, a new molecule, and orient it in a certain way, was now all much
simpler. A bit of density charge well distributed on one side and that would be oriented towards water, but
3 The fact that details of the intermolecular forces so small could be of any interest on a much bigger scale it’s evident to whoever has forgotten a water bottle in the
freezer; freezing, the water molecules which are oriented on the liquid state, but have somehow the possibility to move and fluctuate, once they adopt the order and
orientation requested by the solid state must take a position in precise formation, following the distance and orientation given by the charge density. For this reason, water
is one of the few liquids that, freezing, increases its volume, making an explosion of the glass bottle that contains it. But not every downside comes to make harm, the fact
that ice takes more volume (being more dense and lighter) than liquid water, allows that ice in the rivers stays on the surface and so fish and everything that rivers could
have continue to proceed, swimming with cheerful discretion under the ice layer on the surface.
4 To the ones who never asked themselves why the water is usefully liquid in the temperature gap of our lives and to change to gaseous state needs 100 degrees, while
molecules made of three, four or five atoms as simple as water, like carbon dioxide CO2, ammonia NH3, methane CH4 are gases, we can point out that this is due to the
necessity, to change to gaseous state, of breaking the force that bonds water molecules in a liquid state, which is missing in carbon dioxide and in others molecules we
referred to.
5 According to an apologue attributed to Jean Buridan, philosophes, logic and president of the Paris University in the first decades of 1300, an hungry and thirsty donkey,
lied at the same distance between two haycocks, both with water bucket sitting next to it, got nothing helping him to decide what direction to take so, he stays still and
dies.
6 The famous phrase attributed to Archimedes Pythagorean is more likely: ”Give me a foothold and I will lift the Earth”, but, since the Earth wasn’t there yet, we can accept
it in its wider form, quoted with same frequency.
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if in that same molecule there had been some hydrophobic portions they would have stayed far and had
been associated to hydrophobic portions of another molecule.
On the inside of these portions different things could have happened, it would stay dry even if the molecule
was immerse in the water, she didn’t want to know anything about going in, it would have lost that nice
interaction between densities with different charges. Different molecules could interact with each other
whether the charge imbalance that some portions presented could be favorable or not to this encounter, if
it was worth it to lose the attachment to water in order to gain a stronger one.
The power of water found the complicity of an extraordinary element, the carbon, that knew how to build
really long chains and amazing shapes, decorated them thanks to the help given by the rest of the elements
of organic chemistry; oxygen, nitrogen, phosphorus, sulfur, gives that density of charges that had molecules
talk to each other and to water, it made them hug and repel each other. On this principals you could build
everything, complex structures were formed, nucleic acids, sugars, proteins, enzymes, phospholipids which
came together in membranes and organelles, which in turn would assemble into cells. This was really life!
The Protection
Among the many wonders of molecular architecture that were having place, the possibility offered to
carbon had led to the creation, among countless constructions, of the polyphenol molecules, like the one in
Image 2. The hydroxyls we’ve been talking about are hydrophilic portions, that are happy in connect with
the water and allow chemical dialogs with other molecules. The aromatic rings are portions with a high
electric density, being also these good for so many things. A molecule just like every other, at the beginning
of history, but that presented features that would make them pass every selection that life had prepared
for them, to have it become one of the main protagonist in the plant world and with a great effect on
animal life too. It started with the need to protect the plant life from ultraviolet sunlight. The earliest forms
of life had developed in water, which filtered out the solar ultraviolet radiation harmful to life; because
they break the bonds between DNA caring genetic modifications, at a time where there were still no
atmosphere or protective ozone layer. But outside the water there was a land to be colonized, but only
plant forms with appropriate protection form the UV radiation could venture to its conquest.
The details on the polyphenol make them perfect filters for the UV light, giving a remarkable protective
effect. The earliest forms of plant live that came out of the water, seems to have taken with them, in the
hydrated small ducts of their organs, a big load of polyphenols. Also because, even if it’s true that there are
many molecules that absorb UV and are effective filters, the construction of Image 2 had something else.
One of the reasons why UV radiations are harmful is that these create free radicals. On the bonds of
molecules the electrons are paired, so, going back to water , on the OH bond the oxygen atom brings an
electron and the hydrogen atom brings another one making the pair of the bond.
There are some circumstances, as for example some UV radiations, that break a bond so that an atom finds
itself with its electron without a companion, which we name free radical, and throws itself over everything
there is so it get it back. A free radical is a very dangerous vampire that goes around bouncing, for sinking
their teeth on the first person that goes by, to extract an atom to pair with its unpaired electron finding
finally some piece, but turning its victim into a vampire looking for more victims! And if by any chance this
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finds DNA, protein, cell membranes, molecules of live in general, the damage can be lethal, because the
vampire effect in a chain makes them incapable of developing their own tasks. Chemical structures such as
the one in Image 2 can face a free radical without suffering any harm, because the bite’s consequences (an
unpaired electron) comes located in the sequence of aromatic rings, where it can spin quietly without
making any harm. Basically, the bite is just a bit more than a tickle, and the dangerous vampire is redeemed
and transformed into a docile molecule, with no further consequences.
Well, those molecules that were so good at absorbing dangerous UV radiation were also good at
neutralizing the extremely dangerous free radicals. It was worth it to bring along with them, while the plant
world was entering into the intricate maze of evolution.
The multiple features.
The marvelous colors of so many flowers, fruits, the colors of grape and wine they are due largely to one of
the many classes which make up the polyphenols, anthocyanin. But why do they have such beautiful
colors? Each molecule absorbs light: is as if light ended up inside a box, so the longest the box is, the
longest the wavelength of the absorbed light is too. Many molecules, out of small boxes, absorb, in a sort of
efficient way, the short length of UV light wave, including, as we have seen, all the polyphenols. But in one
particular class of polyphenol known as anthocyanin, the sequence of conjugated double bonds
(meaning alternating with single bonds) lengthens the box build for the polyphenol molecule until this
makes it be able to absorb even the length of the visible wave.
Image 4: the typical molecular structure of an anthocyanin, one of the molecules to which we owe the
beauty of colors of flowers and fruit.
On Image 4 you can see the molecule structure of a typical anthocyanin, with a sequence of bonds
conjugated that goes from the aromatic ring on the left and reaches up to the one on the right, as shown in
the Image. A sequence this long of double bonding conjugated absorbs length from the visible wave, as
reported in Picture 4, in which you see an absorption spectrum of a mixture of polyphenols extracted from
grape skins. The line indicates how much light is absorbed by the molecule on every length of a wave.
Normally, visible light is made of all the wavelengths and gets decomposed in its components, for example,
on the rainbow. On our spectrum, on the right part of the image, you can see that all light is absorbed into
the violet zone (and this absorption is what protects against harmful ultraviolet radiation that we talked
about earlier), up to the green part. The color that we perceive it the mixture of what remains, As shown in
the right part of the figure, the warm tones of red, yellow, of what is left of green, blue and purple.
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Image 5: the absorption spectrum of visible light on wine’s polyphenols, on the right the light that remains
after the filtered action of the molecule.
By changing one or more details of the molecule, this one gets to absorb more or less wavelengths
responsible of the different colors, giving birth to the wonderful variety of tones of colors there is to offer
on flowers, fruits, leaves at a particular moment. Oh yeah, the leaves. Image 5 show us that is absorbed
also a part of green color, the length of this wave is essential for the synthesis of chlorophyll. This
observation indicates yet another meaningful protective effect of anthocyanin. At some particular
moments too much light, too much heat, leaves still too young, or an excess of radiation can take an
overload of the chlorophyll function, with the loss of efficiency and the damage of the organelle
responsible for this function. Once again, and thanks to their molecular structure, the polyphenol exerts a
protective action, filtering the excess of green light that could be harmful. In many gardens the hedge of
Photinia is used as an ornament, for those beautiful young leaves of a wonderful red before taking the
green of their mature state.The red phase represents a moment of active molecule synthesis with a light
filtering action, with our polyphenols that come to the rescue of those young and tender leaves, protecting
them from what for them would be excessive light. Us in general, we simply say that those are some
beautiful colored leaves, and they really are, but besides that they’re a marvel of molecular engineering, if
we see them also as the extraordinary mechanisms that regulate the development and the and relations
with the surrounding environment.
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Image 6- young Photinia leaves, with their beautiful colors due to the anthocyanin that protect them from
excessive light.
Wow, how lucky! These molecular structures that are so good at absorbing the dangerous UV radiation,
that are also so good at neutralizing free radicals, are also good at protecting from excessive light!. They
offer a package of inalienable features. If they did not exist, we would have to invent them! It was a
success, by now no plant could do without them!
And all the other features.
So this way, one of the countless molecular structures born out of the shaping force of the water molecule
and of the carbon’s chemical inventive, gathered in itself many functions essential for the survival of plants
becoming an indispensable component and shaping up, still keeping its own identity of base, in thousands
and thousands of variations on the topic to respond to the specific demands of a plant and to still play
more tasks. Today is noted that plants respond to almost all situations of biotic and abiotic stress (including
herbivore actions, fungal and viral pathogens, injuries, extreme temperatures, excessive light, UV radiation,
imbalance in mineral nutrients, drought ', salinity', lack of oxygen, ozone exposure, herbicides) increasing
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its own levels of anthocyanin7. The mechanisms that allow this to happen are still not completely clear, but
it certainly is correlated to the broad spectrum protective action concentrated in these molecules, because
of their structure. It is not right to recall, discussing the effects documented by rigorous scientific studies
and based on specific molecular causes, the famous “Elixir against all evil” of many fantasy tells, but a plant
might say we are talking exactly about that. And next to these fundamental actions, throughout the ages
Nature has found in details infinite variations on the topic of the polyphenol molecules, according to which
molecular structural and botanist are looking to completely understand, the way of delivering their many
other essential tasks, such as the action of chemical signals attraction of insects for pollination and seed
dispersal, the defense against pathogenic microbes and many other more. There was enough to do for
ages, but the world was also being colonized by other creatures that unlike plants roamed around the
planet but just as them, they were made of molecules and molecular superstructures built on water and
carbon chemistry. And one of these creatures didn’t take long to discover the use of some classes of
polyphenols around certain tasks.
Polyphenol and the animal world.
The story of the encounter between man and polyphenol probably started with feeding and the ingestion
of plants. The topic of the diet contribution of polyphenols and their metabolism it’s obviously huge and
already studied. It’s interesting to remember that there are evident and scientifically probed effects of
polyphenol on people’s health8, according to referable mechanisms to some of the protective actions
described here before, beginning with its notorious effect on longevity as a result of moderate wine
consumption until the recent studies on the role of polyphenol contained in the green on bone density9.
There is some beauty on the thought that one molecule on the plat world has specific actions of molecules
and molecular mechanisms of the animal world. That is just because us the livings have all being built on
the same alphabet, which comes from that small asymmetry that we’ve discussed. And there is wall that
can hold them, all molecules speak the same universal language, in a very wide brotherhood and within a
very narrow range of temperature, pressure and atmospheric composition, enabling life as we know it. And
dialog now, dialog tomorrow, man didn’t take long to discover that some plant components had a great
impact on animal skin, fixing it and making them resistant and incorruptible, useful for clothes and tents.
Who performed this job was called tanner, out of a German term which meant cortex, 'cause tanning
required the use of certain barks. Later on, it was understood that the action of the cortex was due to some
molecules that this one had that could not be called other than tannins. And obviously, these molecules
belonged to the polyphenol class, its hydroxyl were ideal for interacting with polar groups within the
protein molecule (mainly, collagen) which skin was made of, and the wide structure, with the aromatic
rings, represented a strong bridge that united and strengthen different collagen fibrils. This technological
feature of polyphenols is revealed 'a great help to humanity, which continued to progress and develop
7 Flavonoids : chemistry, biochemistry, and applications, edited by Ø. M. Andersen and K. R. Markham, CRC press, Taylor & Francis Group, ISBN 0-8493-2021-6, 2006, p.
408
8 A. Scalbert, I.T. Johnson, M. Saltmarsh “Polyphenols: antioxidants and beyond”, Am J Clin Nutr 2005;81(suppl):215S–7S
9 Z. Chen, M. B. Pettinger, C. Ritenbaugh, A. Z. LaCroix, J. Robbins, B. J. Caan, D. H. Barad, I.A. Hakim (2003), “Habitual tea consumption and risk of osteoporosis: a
prospective study in the women’s health initiative observational cohort” Am. J. Epidemiol. 158, 772–781
10
knowledge. And as the knowledge increased, new and surprising dialog ways between vegetal polyphenols
and animal protein came to light.
The current molecular biology explains that everything that happens within our bodies, growth, illness,
exhaustion, movement, sleep, just about everything, its mediated by protein molecules, that tell our other
cells what to do, where to go, what to change, in a waterfall process extremely complex.
These molecule signals are produced when the events happening stimulate the activity or the gene that
produces them. Some genes, for example, are activated to trigger the aging of our tissues. Well, flipping
through the pages of the magazine “Oxidative medicine and cellular longevity” you can read that the
polyphenols of grapes “Acetylates the gene Sirt3, that activates Fox03 leading to the activation of the path
PINK-1/PARKIN enhancing the mitochondrial fission and mitophagy10”. Said this was could seem a bit dark,
but mitophagy it’s a cellular repair mechanism closely linked to aging, and these studies, performed on
mouse tissues, indicate in a scientifically rigorous way an anti-aging effect on the heart tissue promoted by
the action of polyphenol. That polyphenol keeps the heart’s tissue young, or at least it delays aging! It’s an
extraordinary result, it’s beautiful, and it’s a miraculous molecule, but…. But how can the complex path of
genes that preside anti-aging of the heart be triggered by a molecule created in a heartless world?
(Meaning that the animal life forms were developed way after the plants). There is no safe answer to this
giddiness, if not that (a bit vague) that molecular interaction happen according to the universal language
that has mold them form the beginning of time. And if we look closely, even a grain of sand was formed
ages earlier than the gear where it will end up, and that no pigeon needs to now that the car right below
him has just been washed.
It just happens when it happens it occurs and we take note, while we will never know the million times that
this event didn’t happened! So, there is no safe answer, but we should take note, data in hand, that among
the many protein molecules to exchange a few pleasant interactions with, fortunately (?), some
polyphenols like to interact so as to fit between the dialogues of Sirt3, foxo3, PINK-1 / PARKIN and
rejuvenate the fabric of the heart.
Polyphenols on the skin.
Beyond the quoted example, there are now numerous scientific evidence indicating that the dialogue
between some polyphenols and the plethora of molecules that rule the behavior of our cells is very active
and that will lead, from our point of view and that of our tissues, often in significant benefits. The same
way, is current scientific evidence, the important role that polyphenol have in an essential mechanism for
our lives, the defense. In fact we don’t need to forget that, if it could be symbolized with an image what
happens each moment in many districts of our body, a suitable choice would be that of a depiction of a
siege in which both are in a furious and bloody battle between besieged (cells form our defense systems)
and besiegers (bacteria, radiations, viruses, everything extraneous to our functioning). The besieged split
furiously to combat besiegers and it’s this continuous action that we owe our survival to. But it could also
happen that, in the heat of a battle that is fought without a rest, the volume of the fire is so, that not only
the besiegers are attacked but our own tissue, that this way turn out damaged by friendly fire. It may
happen that some minor anomalies on a genetic level present in some individuals, due to age or for the
onset of disease, the delicate mechanism that controls the “fire” and “stop the fire” lose control. Our
defenders besieged, always with the weapons to their backs ready for action, attack at the slates signal but
10 S. Das, G. Mitrovsky, H. R. Vasanthi, and D. K. Das, “Antiaging Properties of a Grape-Derived Antioxidant Are Regulated by Mitochondrial Balance of Fusion and Fission
Leading to Mitophagy Triggered by a Signaling Network of Sirt1-Sirt3-Foxo3-PINK1-PARKIN”, Oxidative Medicine and Cellular Longevity, Volume 2014, Article ID 345105,
13 pages, http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2014/345105
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don’t listen to the stop order, they continue shooting like crazy, hitting everything. Just as those saloon
brawls in many western films, good and evil ones destroy all the place.
There are many pathologies referred to an excessive friendly fire, in many districts, from the cardiovascular
system to the skeletal system, but the battlefield, that due to its visibility shows more consequences of the
continuous fight between besieged and besiegers is the skin. Land of border by definition, our skin is
constantly object of attack of any kind, intern and extern that can affect their condition and functions,
leading to aging, photo aging, inflammation and immune dysfunction. It’s funny to think how beneath the
apparent splendor of a velvety skin lurks a constant and terrible struggle, where, on the long run, both the
enemy and friendly fire destroy tissue, limits elasticity, creating those things we call wrinkles, generating
spots on the skin, so, those visible war damage which are signs of aging.
Just as Colt and Winchester were the typical weapons on the far-west, the molecular battles that take place
in our body and on our skin are identified with another type of weapon, produced continuously with
sophisticated mechanisms from our defense systems: the free radicals, particularly those found in
molecules containing oxygen, this is the reason or the acronym ROS (Reactive Oxygen Species). We had
already found these terrible vampires when talking about the effect of UV radiation from the sun. It’s funny
that in both the plant and animal kingdom, the molecular weapons can be so similar, but we have seen that
we are all organized on the same asymmetry, which has evolved common tools. The ROS are the favorite
weapon of our defensive system, effective and powerful, against all kind of enemies, capable of looking
right at the molecular structure, to the cell wall or the DNA of bacteria and invaders in general. But
especially because they are so terribly effective and destructive, must always be kept under control. An
excessive or imbalanced production, frequent consequence of aging or pathologies, as we have seen, turns
against us, damaging the components of our own cell walls, destroying our tissues, taking the loss of
function, and alterations in friendly cells, in a blinded self-destructive madness framework that closely
resembles the famous description of Lucretius, often invoked as proof of his own madness, on the
consequences of the use of wild animals in battle11.
Fight without a truce and countless treats, loss of control of the defense mechanisms and excessive
production of free radicals with generation of oxidation mechanisms, are all things that on the long run
exhaust and have always wrinkled the face skin, that have faced this world. But it was and it is that world
that, as we have seen, from the dawn of time have hosted the molecular forms of polyphenols, which owe
their success, besides many other functions, also to the capacity of making free radical harmless, carrying
out an antioxidant action. It had to happen sooner or later, it was inevitable that they found each other. At
a moment , on that face, someone took those plant kingdom molecules into the skin’s battlefield, with ROS
that whistled everywhere, their free radicals that were sinking their teeth in the delicate face collagenous,
that skin that was sagging. It was at least a few hundred million years that, in the block close by, the plant
kingdom, the polyphenols were amused to hunt free radicals generated by all forms of stress, it did not
seem real to have this exciting new playground available. “Small world, isn’t?” it seems to be said by the
first polyphenol that, with the unrivaled skill of the ancient custom, captured and tamed his first, stunned,
radical free skin.
11 “They used as a war object even bulls, and tried to hurl against the enemy ferocious wild boars. Some put in the front of their troupes the lions, Armed with tamers
and cruel trainers able to brake and hold them with chains; but it was useless, because, crazed from confused massacre, ruffling without any distinction the ranks,
shaking from everywhere of the tremendous manes, the knights couldn’t calm the frightened terrified horses and direct them with brake against enemies. The lionesses
infuriated leaping from all sides, attacking the face those who faced and hitting behind those who did not suspect, and tightening them tipped them to the ground both
injured and losers, clinging to them with bites and with curved claws. The bulls stepped over drivers, trampling them with their hooves, and from under they hurt with
their horns the sides and belly of the horses, upsetting the ground threateningly. The boars were biting with strong teeth even allies, dyeing furious with his own blood
the broken lance, and performed a confused slaughter of knights and knaves. Tito Lucrezio Caro, De Rerum Natura, Libro V vv. 1307-1327
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The creams.
And now it’s our turn, that is a whole other story, most recent but equally passionate. It’s a huge blessing to
be a part of this journey in the dimensions and in time and being able to build on the knowledge, which
generations or researchers and thousands of experiments have developed. And that continuous to develop
and implement into new directions: we were among the first to use the polyphenols from skin and seeds of
grape in materials for applications in medicine, listening to the dialog that once more was renewed by
these molecules coming from the plant world and those who rule our healing process, of our tissues
repair12.. We have learned much from these experiences and we’ve once again used the language of
molecules, water, carbon architecture, to make creams that could put at the disposal of the defense of our
skin the features that have made great the history of polyphenols: their interaction with collagenous, the
cellular rejuvenation and the effectiveness of the action against free radicals. The formulas have been
studied accurately reducing to the minimum everything that is not essential and could interfere in the
polyphenol’s action. Their effectiveness is enhanced by combining them in a studied way with another
champion of the molecular mechanism that control life and the tissue repair, hyaluronic acid, which is also
leading actor of the new material applications in medicine and also a protagonist in an equally interesting
and endless story that the one of the polyphenols in the evolution of animal life13.
To this big scientific adventure we add the enormous ethic vale of going to retreat these precious
molecules in abandoned mines, that is skin and seeds at the end of winemaking process. A waste mountain
in the common vision, a priceless mine if, like we tried to underline in this story, we expand our dimension
in an incredible journey, from the infinitely large of time to the infinitely small of molecules. Teaching us
the enormous value that thanks to the culture we recognize in those that without them, we would call
waste, we firmly believe that still, once more polyphenols come together with evolution. We created an
association to promote these values14. Our products are developed through projects and partnerships with
grape growers and wine producers, who like us share the vision of the treasures of nature and territory,
working together on different aspects of a common heritage. We select their treasure, analyze it to
understand quality and quantity of molecules, we formulate them to make them available for the skin and
its defense.
We make the vision of anti-aging creams come true out of science and out of territory. In the tuning stages,
in the lab tests skin cells are cultivated, they are put in contact with a substance that releases free radicals
and it’s always a great excitement when we witness that in presence of polyphenol the cells that without
these are killed by the free radicals keep their vitality. And you can imagine the face of those poor free
radicals, that after having suffered with polyphenols in the plant world, after having found them in the
animal world, they find themselves in front of them even in the world of in vitro test tubes. Small world,
isn’t?
12
G. Iviglia , D. Bollati , C. Cassinelli , E. Torre , M. Morra : “Dreamer: An Innovative Bone Filler Paste For The
Treatment Of Periodontitis” World Biomaterials Congress Montreal, 2016
13
M. Morra “Engineering of Biomaterials Surfaces by Hyaluronan”, Biomacromolecules, 2005, 6; 1205-1223
14
www.associazioneinnuva.it
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For all these reasons, our products are not just beauty, not just creams. They are nature, molecules, cells,
geography, weather, people……. They are life. And there is beauty on being all together in a small jar:
nature, cells, molecules, mechanisms, genes, polyphenol, time, ages, landscapes, grape products, wine, skin,
faces, and smiles. There is infinitely everything, and it’s beautiful!
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