Why Forest Extract

What You’ll Learn From Our Forest Extract Guide

Through this detailed content, you will learn about the riches of forest soil and why they're the key ingredient in Forest Riot's holistic cosmetics microbiome that gives you flawless skin and the forest soil extract used in our product range is scientifically proven to stimulate the immune system and recreate a more natural balance. You will have a chance to peer into the proverbial microscope and uncover nature’s secrets at the micro level. 

We hope that by doing so, you can acquire a newfound appreciation for life’s littlest wonders and Forest Riot’s mission to restore the precious relationship between nature and humanity. The following content is dedicated to all nature lovers, scientific contributors, pursuers of holistic beauty, and our irreplaceable home planet.

Understanding the Skin’s Microbiome

Your skin is a natural home to hundreds of species of microorganisms that form its microbiome. The microbiome strengthens your immune defenses and offers a natural barrier against harmful environmental pollutants.

Dr. Heidi H. Kong, a senior investigator of cutaneous microbiome and inflammation at the National Institute of Health (NIH), analyzed the skin microbiome of healthy individuals taken from over 20 skin sites. The human skin is essentially a complex system with various niche areas (e.g., moist, dry, or sebaceous (oily) regions) that attract different types of commensal microbes. These microorganisms live in harmony with skin cells and differ in composition and density between people.

Dr. Kong’s works drew a strong connection between microbiomes, the body’s immune system, and a person’s susceptibility to diseases. She eventually co-published a catalog called the Skin Microbial Genome Collection that identified about 85% of skin microbiomes found in healthy skin through 19 body sites.

Scientists continue to develop advanced techniques and tools for studying the complexities of the skin's microbiome and its relation to health and immune responses. However, there remains underlying evidence that the interaction among skin microbiomes can implicate the host's health. 

The Microbiome’s Ever-Shifting System

While your skin’s microbiome is naturally an excellent defender that develops as you grow, keeping it in optimal shape is a challenge. Doing so requires consistently careful and complex interactions between the various microorganisms on your skin and your skin cells. Other factors, such as ambient temperature, skin moisture, and the pH of substances that touch your skin, also affect the health and biodiversity of your microbiome.

Our human ancestors’ exposure to pristine forest environments for millions of years gradually led to a symbiotic connection between the skin’s microbiome and the natural world.

Humans need to coexist with natural landscapes like forests for contact with beneficial bacteria that drive a balanced response against foreign/external allergens. The need has become more pressing as allergens have risen due to urbanization. One biodiversity hypothesis states that consistent contact with a natural environment enriches the skin’s natural microbiome and promotes immune balance while also protecting the body from various allergies and inflammatory disorders.

The modern-built environment of urban jungles and cityscapes has created a new world that limits biodiversity on the micro-ecological level. As such, it drives greater dysbiosis (imbalance in the skin's microbial community), which significantly increases the risks of inflammation and gradually leads to various health problems.

According to the World Allergy Organization (WAO), "In order to accomplish this, a better understanding of interconnected ecology of humans, microbes and the environment is required." This does not necessarily mean forsaking technology and modern conveniences to return ‘back to nature.' Instead, the WAO proposes that by "moving forward with nature and working with microbes on the skin and countless other niches, we can support a terrain of health."

Microbiome Management for All Ages

Your skin's microbiome changes at different life stages, each version requiring proper care to keep the microbiota balanced. Exposure to the environment, stress, and hormonal changes all contribute to the microbiome changes experienced over a lifetime.

Older adults require natural cosmetics infused with forest microbes to help cope with the effects of aging. Specifically, older adults must overcome senescence or apoptosis resulting from oxidative damage when the skin's antioxidizing capabilities start to slow down. Exposing older adults to microbiome-friendly cosmetics can potentially mitigate the impact of aging by intervening in the interactome (molecular interactions in the skin cell) found in the genome-microbiome-exposome trio that shapes the aging process. 

While traditionally, the infant's familiarization process involved direct contact with natural landscapes, this has proven increasingly difficult with urbanization. In these cases, Ecocert-certified cosmetics like Forest Riot's range of dermatologically tested products can help fill the absence.

The Benefits of Forest Extract

Finnish researchers have carefully studied and formulated  a technology we call Forest Extract. A specially harvested and treated essence of forest soil, mostly comprised of decomposed plant matter (i.e., peat) filled with hundred of thousands beneficial inactive forest microbes. It starts as a fine powder and is carefully blended with other organic cosmetic ingredients to create revitalizing and nourishing skin lotions.

Introducing Forest Extract extract to your skincare provides the biodiversity required to support optimal health and, by extension, your appearance. On the contrary, using beauty products with synthetic ingredients, such as chemical fillers, can greatly compromise your skin's natural microbiome. 

The organic nature of the Forest Extract makes it ideal for pregnancy-safe cosmetics, vegan cosmetics, and holistic skin care. 

Forest Riot's Forest Extract was built for the modern body. By directly providing your skin with high biodiversity microbial exposure, our skincare mimics the skin's experience of living in the forest. Research by an expert team of researchers from UuteScientific in Finland has uncovered multiple potential benefits of including our extract in cosmetic products.

Supports Skin Microbiome 

Forest Extract has been scientifically tested and proven suitable for Cosmos-certified cosmetics. The Cosmos organic and Cosmos natural certification establishes the formula as a clean beauty product without harmful, synthetic additives. All Cosmos-certified products have been carefully tested and proven to fulfill sustainability practices while providing customers with genuinely organic and natural ingredients.

Under the conditions of a well-maintained microbiome, your skin can effectively safeguard itself from unwanted factors. The balanced ecosystem helps preventing any one species from dominating and causing an imbalance that can drive discoloration, acne, blackhead breakouts, and different types of inflammation. Maintaining this balance supports your skin staying resilient and glowing with an optimal appearance.

The World Allergy Organization has announced in their Biodiversity Statement that: “Biodiversity, the variability among living organisms from all sources are closely related, at both the macro- and micro-levels. Loss of the macro-diversity is associated with shrinking of the microdiversity, which is associated with alterations of the indigenous microbiota.”

In essence, the hypothesis suggested the vital relationship between humanity and our surrounding environments, where urbanization has modified the microbiota, reducing the available bacteria that we need to maintain optimal skin health.

Promotes Natural Skin Barrier Function

According to the same Finnish research force examining Forest Extract, unlike cosmetic products that contain synthetic ingredients that compromise the skin’s natural microbiome, using our formula does not harm the essential proteins (including Loriclin, Claudin, Filaggrin, and Ki67) responsible for forming the skin’s natural barrier.

In fact, using the solution has been shown to promote skin barrier strength properties after three weeks of regular use, particularly against chemical irritation. A scientific test comparing a base lotion containing Forest Extract with a placebo without the active ingredient showed that the formula provided a stronger defense against irritation.

Specifically, the results showed higher transepidermal water loss and erythema index for the placebo sites than those exposed to the Forest Extract. The increase in these values indicates a weakening of skin barrier functions.

Safeguarding Against Aging and Stress

It is largely believed that a combination of factors is responsible for compromising your natural skin barrier. These include gradual decline with the aging process, stress buildup, and the excessive production of cytokines (e.g., TNFα and IFNg) that inhibit collagen production. And collagen is a crucial building block for building and maintaining healthy and supple skin. Essentially, with Forest Extract added to your skincare, you can support healthy skin barrier functions by keeping collagen levels optimized despite elevated stress and aging effects.

Reviving Skin Microbiome With the Riches of the Forest 

The combination of in-vitro test results and past academic research all point toward the forest microbe’s ability to help revitalize your skin’s natural microbiome. Picture your skin as a precious microcosm similar to a forest habitat, where its entire delicate ecosystem thrives or collapses according to a balanced relationship between each microorganism within it.

These microbes gathered from the forest help to strengthen the biodiversity of your skin and its responses. The forest microbes provide the microorganic reinforcements to rebalance your skin’s ecosystem. Additionally, forest microbes have been proven safe for use, without the risks often associated with synthetic products containing harmful fillers and contaminants.

By regularly and continuously applying Forest Riot products enriched with Forest Extract, you can rebuild the vital connection with the Earth's natural environment.