Phytoceramides
Plant-derived ceramides taken orally to support the skin's own barrier lipids.
A controlled trial found reduced water loss, though other skin measures did not shift.
On the label: Phytoceramides. Also known as Plant ceramides, Glucosylceramides.
What it does for you
Supports the barrier from the inside, which shows up as skin losing less water.
Why we use it
Hydration is the outcome oral supplements support most reliably, so we build toward it from more than one direction.
Mechanism
Dietary glucosylceramides are broken down in the gut into building blocks that are absorbed and may feed into, or signal for, the skin's own ceramide production.
What the studies say
Transepidermal water loss was significantly lower than placebo at 12 weeks (p = 0.04), having shown only a tendency at 8 weeks (p = 0.07). No significant differences were observed in any secondary outcome, including skin hydration. Water loss is the one endpoint that moved. No supplement-related adverse events.
- Human in vivo (oral)
- n = 30 healthy Japanese subjects aged 20 to 64 enrolled, 29 analysed (placebo 15, test 14)
- 12 weeks
Randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled; plant-derived ceramides and glucosylceramides versus placebo. Primary outcome transepidermal water loss, with skin hydration, an itching visual analog scale and the Japanese Skindex-29 as secondary outcomes
Efficacy and Safety of Oral Administration of Wine Lees Extract (WLE)-Derived Ceramides and Glucosylceramides in Enhancing Skin Barrier Function: A Randomized, Double-Blind, Placebo-Controlled Study Sanjaya A, Ishida A, Li X, Kim Y, Yamada H, Kometani T, Yamashita Y, Kim YI. Nutrients, 2024. DOI 10.3390/nu16132100
All eight authors were employees of Pharma Foods International Co., Ltd., which sponsored the study. Small sample of 29 analysed, and the single positive endpoint sits close to the significance threshold. Registered as UMIN000050422.
Reviews plant-derived ceramides, which it calls phytoCERs, as oral dietary supplements for skin hydration and barrier reinforcement. Notes that beneficial effects have been indicated across animal and human studies, that phytoCERs are preferred largely for their assumed higher safety as dietary-source isolates, and that little work has been done on topical application of them.
- Review
Potential Applications of Phyto-Derived Ceramides in Improving Epidermal Barrier Function Tessema EN, Gebre-Mariam T, Neubert RHH, Wohlrab J. Skin Pharmacology and Physiology, 2017. DOI 10.1159/000464337
Narrative review. Its own framing is that the evidence has been indicated rather than established, which is the appropriate weight to give it.
Free and complex forms of the predominant maize sphingoid base were found in lymph after administration, and were incorporated into ceramide structures in the intestinal cells. However the cumulative recovery in lymph was very low, and the authors conclude that plant glucosylceramide is only slightly absorbed in the intestine and that the intact sphingoid base does not appear to be reused well in tissues. This is the honest limit on the oral-to-skin pathway.
- Animal (rat) absorption study
Lipid absorption assay of lymph from the thoracic duct in lymphatic duct cannulated rats, after administration of maize glucosylceramide
Intestinal absorption of dietary maize glucosylceramide in lymphatic duct cannulated rats Sugawara T, Tsuduki T, Yano S, Hirose M, Duan J, Aida K, Ikeda I, Hirata T. Journal of Lipid Research, 2010. DOI 10.1194/jlr.M002204
Rat study, not human, and an absorption endpoint rather than a skin endpoint. Included because it bounds the mechanism: it is the reason the proposed route from dietary glucosylceramide to skin ceramide should be stated as possible rather than demonstrated.