subject: Treat Acne Pimples With Essential Fatty Acids [print this page] While scientists dont fully understand the cause of pimples, the role of essential fatty acids in your body, including our skin, is reasonably understood. This understanding has led to some scientists and all-natural health practitioners looking at the effects and advantages of essential fatty acids for epidermis issues such as pimples.
Udo Erasmus is a writer with post graduate student studies in genetics, and biochemistry, and a phd in Nutrition. He believes there are nutritional deficiencies and problems that may cause or exacerbate pimples, though theyre not as easy as the usual ones about chocolate!
Central to his belief is that: "Hard fats and (hard) protein debris block narrow pores and routes in our skin, and invite infection by bacteria who feast on the mess". (P346)
He believes pimples is a result of "fatty degeneration". Factors in this are:
* fats associating poorly with protein
* too numerous 'hard' fats
* not enough essential fatty acids
Hard fats are also called saturated fatty acids. These are the fats that are discovered in most food, including animal fats and dairy. Their name comes from the fact that the fat molecules carry the highest amount of hydrogen molecules that they possibly could. This has significance in the way these fats act in our body. Some of these saturated fats have a high melting point, like butter and milk fat.
An excess can cause situations for our arteries and heart health.
Fatty acids, of the essential and non essential kind, are located in our cell membranes. This includes the membranes of the epidermis. Erasmus describes the properties of saturated fatty acids as tending to stick together. And since they have a higher melting point, they are usually more likely to be clump together and form deposits when we Consume them in excess. So, they are harder for your body to get eliminate. And as well as clumping together, they may clump with other things like protein, minerals, and cholesterol. Excess sugar might be a dilemma because our body converts excess sugar into saturated fatty acids.
Other situations with excess saturated fatty acids includes the fact that your body might convert them into unsaturated fatty acids, which may then oxidize if we don't Consume enough fatty acids.
Saturated fatty acids might decrease the supply of fresh air to our tissues, by making blood skin cells which carry fresh air stick together and so impede that crucial transportation system which normally carries air to our cells.
Excess fat, including excess saturated fats, are stored in the adipose cells in our epidermis. These are fat storage centers.
Erasmus suggests intensive W3 (alpha linolenic acid) and w6 (flax and linoleic acid) essential fatty acids in the correct ratio.
Essential fatty acids have free receptors for hydrogen bonds. This characteristic changes the way the molecules are structured in terms of the shape they have. And it is this different shape, a kinked shape, that means they don't clump together with the affinity that saturated fats do. And they also have a lower melting point - so they are more liquid also. Because of this difference in structure, they also have a slight negative molecular charge, and given that like charges repel, this is another reason why they don't clump together. Erasmus characterizes these property of unsaturated fats as providing 'fluidity' to cell membranes. He says this allows the skin cells to fulfill fundamental chemical functions.
Irritation, a characteristic of pimples, is associated with a deficiency in the essential fatty acid LNA, or alpha linolenic acid. Erasmus writes that although irritation isnt a classical symptom of LNA, when individuals take alpha linolenic acid supplements, this symptom might be reversed.
Essential fatty acids as a group are strongly anti-inflammatory. Another essential fatty acid, linoleic acid (LA) has distinct reference to pimples. When there is a deficiency of linoleic acid, the oil creating glands in your skin make sebum that is mixed with oleic acid. Oleic acid is found in butter and land animal fats. Nevertheless, in excess, it May interfere in essential fatty acid use. But more importantly for acne pimples patients , sebum mixed with oleic acid is aggravating to your skin. It lends itself to blockages of the pores that result in acne, blackheads and whiteheads.
