Exclusive | Aloe-lujah! Common household plant has ‘exceptional’ anti-aging powers, could help treat skin disease: study

Scientists have discovered promising new anti-aging powers in a common household plant and it comes just in time to combat the summer sun.

A new study has revealed that aloe vera offers “exceptional anti-aging effects” and could even help treat and prevent skin disease.

The particles extracted from the prickly green succulent were found to ward off skin aging, protect it from sun damage and aid in tissue repair, according to a report published this month in the International Journal of Medicine.

“The aim is to provide new interventions for the development of cost-effective and safe anti-aging treatments for the skin, while also laying the groundwork for exploring other plant-derived nanoparticles for therapeutic and drug delivery,” scientists from Jiangsu University in China wrote in their report.

They set out to explore the plant-based therapy as an alternative to synthetic and stem cell-derived skin care, which can cause adverse reactions, irritation and trigger immune responses.

Other studies have explored aloe’s anti-inflammatory, antioxidant and wound-healing properties, the group noted, but not the extraction of the tiny particles for anti-aging.

It is used across the world for food and herbal medicine, and is known as “universal medicine” and a “natural beautician,” the scientists noted in their report.

“We comprehensively evaluated their anti-skin photoaging ability for the first time in vivo and in vitro models and investigated their possible mechanisms of action,” the research team wrote, referring to testing on animals and in petri dishes.

Among their findings, researchers said they discovered that pretreating the dermis with aloe can inhibit the production of aging cells and prevent skin damage that causes rough, dry flesh, deepening wrinkles and, in more serious instances, tumors and cancers.

As part of their experiment, the scientists split 36 7-week-old female mice into groups and applied nanoparticles from the gel and outer rind of the aloe plant to the shaved backs of some and exposed them to different levels of UV radiation.

The rind, which was previously seen as a waste byproduct of the popular sunburn salve, was actually found to have “significant medicinal value in the field of tissue repair,” outperforming the gel in terms of “anti-DNA damage” and against free radicals.

“This study lays a theoretical foundation for the development of natural and safe anti-photoaging formulations, which are expected to hold considerable potential in the fields of functional skincare products and dermatology in the future,” the report concluded.

Despite a need for clinical trials and protocols for properly prepping the plant, which has 550 different species, they said they strongly believed in the potential it has in the “prevention and treatment of clinical skin diseases, the field of medical aesthetics, and the cosmetics market.”