Melanin, Sunlight, & Vitamin D

[Lecarpetron]

Hi guys, I'd like to hear your thoughts on the connection between skin tone, sunlight exposure, and vitamin D intake/status. I've noticed a trend lately of skin tone appearing lighter and lighter with each successive generation among my friends and family, and I'm curious about plausible mechanisms. A few anecdotes that to me indicate that genetics is not the sole factor in skin tone:

- My family's elder statesmen include siblings who were partially raised in Scandinavia, partly in the US. They are quite tan (peachy/warm tan, not olive/Mediterranean tan). Among their 50+ kids and grandkids, only 1 or 2 possess the warm tan skin tone - the rest are white as ghosts.
- I have a few couple friends with toddlers who are significantly paler than either parent, to the point where both couples make jokes that the baby was switched at birth. Three of the four of these parents are Caribbean, southeast Asian, and middle eastern, so I'm not talking about just white people.

At first I thought this might happen because the present generation spends so much time indoors and uses sunblock when outside. But this can't be the only source of the disparity - my older family members have maintained tans while spending their entire lives in cold climates with weak UV. I also noticed while traveling through Iceland and Norway that many people had warm-toned tans, too.

So, does this observation about tanness dwindling with modern generations ring true to anyone else? Or am I totally off base here and just have some coincidentally pasty acquaintances?

Plausible mechanisms:
- Whiter skin is an adaptation to poor inherited vitamin D status; lighter skin requires less sunlight to make vitamin D. This mechanism is often described as taking place over thousands of years though, and I'm talking 1 - 3 generations.
- Perhaps sunlight to the eyeballs is more important than sunlight to skin in creating vitamin D, explaining how some Nordic people have wintertime tans
- Conversion of cholesterol to vitamin D is "broken" due to some metabolic issue
- The pituitary gland's release of melanin is "broken" due to some metabolic issue
- Any other ideas?

Other stuff I've learned so far about the connection between skin tone and other factors, here and elsewhere:
1. Estrogen tends to darken skin (say wha?? If this is true, I deserve a better tan)
2. Vitamin D status affects the ability to tan - Ray mentioned someone he knew improving the ability to tan with taking oral vitamin D
3. Body building forums think L-tyrosine improves the ability to tan.
4. PUFA status influences whether UV exposure leads to sunburn

Thanks for any thoughts!

 

[dq139]

Hi guys, I'd like to hear your thoughts on the connection between skin tone, sunlight exposure, and vitamin D intake/status. I've noticed a trend lately of skin tone
appearing lighter and lighter with each successive generation among my friends and family, and I'm curious about plausible mechanisms. A few anecdotes that to me indicate that genetics is not the sole factor in skin tone:

- My family's elder statesmen include siblings who were partially raised in Scandinavia, partly in the US. They are quite tan (peachy/warm tan, not olive/Mediterranean tan). Among their 50+ kids and grandkids, only 1 or 2 possess the warm tan skin tone - the rest are white as ghosts.
- I have a few couple friends with toddlers who are significantly paler than either parent, to the point where both couples make jokes that the baby was switched at birth. Three of the four of these parents are Caribbean, southeast Asian, and middle eastern, so I'm not talking about just white people.

At first I thought this might happen because the present generation spends so much time indoors and uses sunblock when outside. But this can't be the only source of the disparity - my older family members have maintained tans while spending their entire lives in cold climates with weak UV. I also noticed while traveling through Iceland and Norway that many people had warm-toned tans, too.

So, does this observation about tanness dwindling with modern generations ring true to anyone else? Or am I totally off base here and just have some coincidentally pasty acquaintances?

Plausible mechanisms:
- Whiter skin is an adaptation to poor inherited vitamin D status; lighter skin requires less sunlight to make vitamin D. This mechanism is often described as taking place over thousands of years though, and I'm talking 1 - 3 generations.
- Perhaps sunlight to the eyeballs is more important than sunlight to skin in creating vitamin D, explaining how some Nordic people have wintertime tans
- Conversion of cholesterol to vitamin D is "broken" due to some metabolic issue
- The pituitary gland's release of melanin is "broken" due to some metabolic issue
- Any other ideas?

Other stuff I've learned so far about the connection between skin tone and other factors, here and elsewhere:
1. Estrogen tends to darken skin (say wha?? If this is true, I deserve a better tan)
2. Vitamin D status affects the ability to tan - Ray mentioned someone he knew improving the ability to tan with taking oral vitamin D
3. Body building forums think L-tyrosine improves the ability to tan.
4. PUFA status influences whether UV exposure leads to sunburn

Thanks for any thoughts!

I think Scandinavians are paler skinned on average. I think that if your family members don't go out in the sun they won't get that peachy tan. Or maybe its that your elder statesmen have better working thyroid. I hear that gives your skin a little more color...also if your ancestors drank alot of milk as u said tyrosine helps u tan faster and milk has alot of tyrosine.

A Olive skin tan (like what Mediterranean's and middle easterners get) is just from generations of dealing with strong UV rays in warm climates....you'll see alot of light skinned middle easterners and Mediterranean's also. So it depends on genes and what your ancestors vit D & melanin levels & sun exposure was.

Copper helps with melanin production also

Emu oil also makes your skin more olive (like half a skin tone darker) it increases melanin.

You could also use a pharmaceutical drug called Melanotan 2....its steroids for tanning basically...I saw online a blond hair pale skinned Irish guy over used Melanotan and literally made his skin black lol..he also gave himself very bad skin cancer which is not funny I feel really bad for him.

So those are the only ones I know of tho

 

[golder]

Anyone got any ideas if Melanotan 2 is safe? I've read that it stimulates melanin to darken the skin pigment. Thanks for any input!