What does sunburn, smoking and excess weight have in common? It may come as a surprise to learn that all can damage your skin—making you look older than you really are. Researchers at Case Western Reserve Medical School in Cleveland arrived at this conclusion after studying 65 pairs of identical and fraternal twins who attended the 2002 Twin Days Festival in Twinsburg, Ohio. “The Twins Days Festival provides a rare opportunity to study a large number of twin pairs to control for genetic susceptibility,” the study authors wrote.The twins, who ranged in age from 18 to 77, answered questions about their weight, skin type, smoking and drinking habits, and history of skin cancer. Each participant was assigned a photodamage score, which graded characteristics such as wrinkling and pigmentation changes. The researchers found that skin damage was similar among the twins whether they were identical or fraternal, which suggests that “people with the same genetic composition are more likely to have the same sort of sun damage,” said Dr. Jonette Keri, an assistant professor of dermatology at University of Miami Miller School of Medicine. In other words, “if your mom aged poorly, you are going to age poorly,” she said.
However, up to 40 percent of aging-related skin changes are due to non-genetic factors, the researchers noted. Age, smoking, and a history of skin cancer were all associated with higher levels of photodamage. In fact, the skin cancer rate among the twins was found to be higher than in the general population, a finding that surprised Dr. Jeffrey Salomon, an assistant clinical professor of plastic surgery at Yale University School of Medicine who was not involved in the research. “This study, with an 8 percent skin cancer rate in twins, seems high when the general population has an incidence of less than 0.5 percent. This in of itself would merit further examination to look at other (potential risk) factors, such as prenatal x-rays, prenatal sonograms and low birth weights,” he said.
Cigarette smoking has long been recognized as a cause of wrinkles. And though smoking-related wrinkles may not appear for a decade or more after the first puff, damage to the connective tissue, which is the basis for the skin’s smooth appearance, occurs with every cigarette smoked. “Cigarette smoke induces matrix metalloproteinases in the skin and inhibits procollagen synthesis through alteration of transforming growth factor beta,” the researchers explained. The combination of smoking and sun exposure is particularly toxic.
