What does melanin do to your face?
Melanin provides pigmentation to your skin, eyes and hair. The substance also absorbs harmful UV (ultraviolet) rays and protects your cells from sun damage.
What is melanin pigment in skin?
Melanin is a natural skin pigment. Hair, skin, and eye color in people and animals mostly depends on the type and amount of melanin they have. Special skin cells called melanocytes make melanin. Everyone has the same number of melanocytes, but some people make more melanin than others.
What does melanin skin look like?
Microscopic appearance. Melanin is brown, non-refractile, and finely granular with individual granules having a diameter of less than 800 nanometers. This differentiates melanin from common blood breakdown pigments, which are larger, chunky, and refractile, and range in color from green to yellow or red-brown.
Does melanin mean dark skin?
Human skin color can vary from almost translucent to almost black. This range of colors comes from the amount and type of a pigment called melanin found in the skin. There are two types of melanin–eumelanin and pheomelanin. In general, the more eumelanin in your skin, the darker your skin will be.
Why is my face darker without sunlight?
Darker areas of skin (or an area that tans more easily) occurs when you have more melanin or overactive melanocytes. Bronzing of the skin may sometimes be mistaken for a suntan. This skin discoloration often develops slowly, starting at the elbows, knuckles, and knees and spreading from there.
What causes the skin to produce more melanin?
UV-A rays from the sunlight penetrate into the lower layers of the epidermis and trigger the melanocytes to produce more melanin. Melanin is produced as a defence mechanism. Sunlight is the major cause of increased melanin production. Other factors include hormonal imbalances, aging and inflammation processes.
Does light skin have melanin?
People with very light skin (types I and II) make very little melanin in their melanocytes, and have very little or no ability to produce melanin in the stimulus of UV radiation.