From Duran to DNA: skincare startup partners with pop
WIRED UK| Joao Medeiros - Science Editor |17th November 2014
WIRED UK| Joao Medeiros - Science Editor |17th November 2014
Cosmetics companies are known for their spurious scientific claims, from creams that affect your genes to facial masks with gold particles. Few, if any, are backed up by scientific studies. But Mayfair-based startup GENEU wants to buck this trend with the one product it offers. U Plus is billed as an anti-ageing skincare treatment which, claims chief scientific advisor Chris Toumazou, is personalised according to your genetics.
Toumazou's background makes him an outsider in the cosmetics industry. He's currently the chief scientist of the Institute of Biomedical Engineering at Imperial College London and the cofounder of two other startups: Toumaz and DNA Electronics. This June, he received the European Inventor Award in the Research category for Genalysis, a microchip that can read a particular DNA sequence on the spot. "I've spent a lot of time trying to understand how all the big cosmetics companies get away with the placebo science and unscientific claims," says Toumazou. "We want to get people to understand that this is very different. Truly personalised products have never existed in the cosmetics industry before."
With GENEU, Toumazou partnered with another unlikely collaborator, Duran Duran's keyboardist Nick Rhodes, who is the company's creative director. "When Chris told me about the moment when he was holding a microchip and decided to put a drop of DNA on it and turn it on, it sent a shiver down my spine," says Rhodes. "He was looking into using it in skincare and licensing the technology out to beauty brands. I told him not to do it. This was such a game-changing idea that it deserved to be quickly developed."
Inside GENEU's store in New Bond Street, London, a team of scientists with PhD qualifications from universities such as Imperial College and Queen Mary, University of London, welcomes customers, who complete a quick lifestyle questionnaire and a 30-minute DNA test, using saliva from a cheek swab. The test analyses two factors -- antioxidant absorption and collagen breakdown; these results determine the rate of individual skin-ageing. Customers are then supplied with two serums personalised according to their DNA results. The creams are produced by biochemists at Imperial College who've also run clinical trials to confirm the efficacy of the serums.
GENEU is developing new tests and products for skin pigmentation, skin whitening and elastin, the protein responsible for skin's elasticity. "Skincare is part of a bigger picture," says Toumazou. "If I can get people to accept that a DNA test is nothing to be intimidated about, then we can do tests that determine how well you metabolise certain drugs and test for breast cancer. We want to bring personalised medicine to retail."
Toumazou's background makes him an outsider in the cosmetics industry. He's currently the chief scientist of the Institute of Biomedical Engineering at Imperial College London and the cofounder of two other startups: Toumaz and DNA Electronics. This June, he received the European Inventor Award in the Research category for Genalysis, a microchip that can read a particular DNA sequence on the spot. "I've spent a lot of time trying to understand how all the big cosmetics companies get away with the placebo science and unscientific claims," says Toumazou. "We want to get people to understand that this is very different. Truly personalised products have never existed in the cosmetics industry before."
With GENEU, Toumazou partnered with another unlikely collaborator, Duran Duran's keyboardist Nick Rhodes, who is the company's creative director. "When Chris told me about the moment when he was holding a microchip and decided to put a drop of DNA on it and turn it on, it sent a shiver down my spine," says Rhodes. "He was looking into using it in skincare and licensing the technology out to beauty brands. I told him not to do it. This was such a game-changing idea that it deserved to be quickly developed."
Inside GENEU's store in New Bond Street, London, a team of scientists with PhD qualifications from universities such as Imperial College and Queen Mary, University of London, welcomes customers, who complete a quick lifestyle questionnaire and a 30-minute DNA test, using saliva from a cheek swab. The test analyses two factors -- antioxidant absorption and collagen breakdown; these results determine the rate of individual skin-ageing. Customers are then supplied with two serums personalised according to their DNA results. The creams are produced by biochemists at Imperial College who've also run clinical trials to confirm the efficacy of the serums.
GENEU is developing new tests and products for skin pigmentation, skin whitening and elastin, the protein responsible for skin's elasticity. "Skincare is part of a bigger picture," says Toumazou. "If I can get people to accept that a DNA test is nothing to be intimidated about, then we can do tests that determine how well you metabolise certain drugs and test for breast cancer. We want to bring personalised medicine to retail."
The above article as appeared in
December 2014 issue of WIRED UK magazine (shown below)
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Photography: Max Oppenheim
December 2014 issue of WIRED UK magazine (shown below)
Source Link
Photography: Max Oppenheim