What is PDRN?

Polydeoxyribonucleotide (PAH-lee, dee-OK-see, RYE-boh, noo-KLAY-oh-tide). Try to say it ten times, fast. Never mind, you can forget that. Thankfully for those of us without a chemistry degree, who struggle with so many tongue-twisting ingredients in our industry, this one is abbreviated to PDRN. Its long name, however, gives us a hint of its DNA origins.

Break down the compound name from back to front the way we were taught in high school chemistry:

• Nucleotide is the molecular building block of DNA and RNA, that same stuff we are all testing to find long-lost ancestors.

• Ribonucleotide is a molecular building block that contains the sugar “ribose” and serves as a fundamental building block of ribonucleic acid (RNA).

• Deoxyribonucleotide is a nucleotide containing deoxyribose and is one of the building blocks of DNA.

• Polydeoxyribonucleotide is a mixture of small DNA fragments.

It is these fragments that are used to signal cells in the body to do certain things.

PDRN has been a darling of the K-beauty world for many years now, deployed in creams, serums, masks, and patches. Like other K-beauty innovations, PDRN was discovered somewhere else. Developed in Italy in the 1980s for medical applications, it was first used as a pharmaceutical injectable for severe wound healing and tissue repair. Remember BB Cream? That was another European innovation that was perfected, industrialized, and popularized through Korea on a global scale, just like PDRN.

South Korean bioscience company PharmaResearch pioneered this latest iteration in 2014 when it launched the brand Rejuran, with a PDRN product as an injectable medical device.

The first introduction in the US was made in February of this year by Marini SkinSolutions’ Marini Reboot PDRN Face Serum, a topical product that is only available in authorized clinics or professional platforms.

Rejuran subsequently launched five cosmetic products in Sephora in March of this year, which speaks to the time lag between cutting-edge K-beauty innovation and it’s gaining traction in the North American market.

Something fishy this way swims. PDRN, as a skin-repairing or cosmetic ingredient, is traditionally made from purified DNA fragments derived from the sperm of certain fish species. Yes, you read that right. Polydeoxyribonucleotide is produced by extracting, purifying, and then breaking down DNA from the reproductive tissue, or milt, of salmon or trout. The milt is collected as a byproduct from commercial fish farming.

Is this just another esoteric yet hopeful skincare ingredient validated only by consumer IHUTs? Hardly, and that’s why this skincare mechanism is having more than just a moment. In the decades of clinicals from Italy to Korea, PDRN has proven itself in extensive In vitro testing to evaluate and validate its cellular and molecular effects.

Calling all skin cells! Skincare has come a long way from the old days of largely just moisturizing skin with questionably effective added-benefit ingredients. Today, some ingredients are designed to influence cellular signaling pathways. This is why consumers are hearing so much about peptides and PDRN.

Signal peptides in skincare are short chains of amino acids that act as cellular messengers, telling your skin cells to produce more structural proteins like collagen and elastin. Like signal peptides, PDRN facilitates communication from outside to inside the cell but does it through receptors of a compound called Adenosine.

It’s all about adenosine – Adenosine is a naturally occurring substance in every cell of the human body. It’s the chemical building block that tells a cell how to behave, like transferring energy, regulating sleep, and directing heart function. In skin cells, it stimulates collagen and hyaluronic acid production, which plumps the cells and reduces wrinkles, sooths irritation and improves firmness.

The PDRN binds to certain receptors on the surface of the skin cell to send a message to activate internal proteins that in turn stimulate enzymes to increase the levels of adenosine to get the cell to start the rejuvenation process and mitigate cellular senescence. Cellular senescenceis a biological process in which stressed or damaged cells permanently stop dividing but remain metabolically active. Instead of dying a natural death such as apoptosis, these “zombie” cells linger and secrete toxic inflammatory signals that damage neighboring healthy cells, contributing to tissue aging and age-related diseases.

To understand the process, think of skin as an enormous housing complex, where each cell is a condo and adenosine is the condo owner. Someone from the community association rings the doorbell and slips a note under the door stating that the owner needs to renovate the inside of the condo immediately, complete with instructions on how to do it. While a human condo owner may indignantly ignore such a request, the adenosine in the cell eagerly complies. It responds to the external signal because that’s what cellular receptors are designed to do.

Real “hope in a bottle” comes in the form of a double helix. These DNA fragments interact with adenosine receptors on skin cells to help trigger an anti-inflammatory response and regenerative signaling, prompting the skin to produce its own collagen, elastin and hyaluronic acid. This mechanism, therefore, is more effective than trying to push low-molecular-weight versions of these compounds into the skin from the outside.

No milt need be spilt. Answering the call from North American consumers with animal sensitivity are new plant-derived PDRN from extracted plant DNA that functions as the fish-derived ingredient. Both target the same biological pathways in the same way. The plant-derived options are from Chlorella vulgaris, a single-celled, freshwater green microalga, and Artemisia capillaris, a flowering plant in the daisy family well known in traditional Chinese medicine. Both cruelty-free alternatives have potentially smaller molecules for better surface penetration and doorbell ringing.

The compounds are so new, however, that they have been slower to catch on with K-beauty consumers. This could be that they do not have the decades of study behind them yet that the fish-based PDRN has. Proven results are a huge driver of the business. Also, Asian K-beauty aficionados do not seem to be as animal sensitive as their western friends. This is evidenced by the enduring popularity of slime from snails, oil from horses, collagen from anything that swims, crawls or moos and just about everything a bee can make.

Could it be that K-beauty proficient Asian purchasers prize product performance over PETA? Mmmm…Now, say that ten times, fast.

References:

Marini SkinSolutions® Launches Marini Reboot™ PDRN Serum, Advancing Re

Squadrito F, Bitto A, Irrera N, Pizzino G, Pallio G, Minutoli L, Altavilla D. Pharmacological Activity and Clinical Use of PDRN. Front Pharmacol. 2017 Apr 26;8:224. doi: 10.3389/fphar.2017.00224. Erratum in: Front Pharmacol. 2022 Nov 21;13:1073510. doi: 10.3389/fphar.2022.1073510. PMID: 28491036; PMCID: PMC5405115.