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Beeswax is a fatty substance secreted by the four pairs of wax glands on the worker bees abdomen. The main components of beeswax are esters formed by higher fatty acids and higher monohydric alcohols. It is essential for the bees in building their hexagonal honeycomb.
You may noticed that there are generally yellow beeswax and white beeswax. In
fact, yellow beeswax is firstly produced after extraction, melting, filtering,
etc. The yellow beeswax turns to white beeswax after processed
by scouring, decoloring, etc.
Due to its high medicinal value, Chinese treat beeswax as one of the
traditional medicinal ingredients and use it both externally and internally.
In modern living, beeswax is not merely used extensively in the food and
pharmaceutical industries but cosmetic industry calls for high demand in
beeswax as well.
In cosmetic formulations, beeswax acts as emollient, stabilizer, plasticizer,
gelling, barrier or film-forming agent. It does not have any toxicity, safe in
cosmetics application and allow the finished products stored for a long time,
so beeswax is widely used in cosmetics.
The formulated cosmetics will not evaporate rapidly after applied on the
skin because beeswax has a strong tolerance to temperature. I personally
experienced and believe that beeswax works very well in moisturizing skin as
it can lock the water to nourish the cells. It also protects the skin surface
from environmental factors. Its quality becomes the common ingredient in
creams and lip balm. In lipsticks making, beeswax not only play a role in
moisturizing, but it also has functions in fixing color, lasting color
protection, etc.
Regularly apply cosmetics made of beeswax on skin will help to soften skin
keratin, rebuild cells and create elastic skin. On the skin surface, beeswax
helps to form a protective barrier which is especially needed in cold
weather or bad weather. The barrier has characteristics such as anti-allergic,
antibacterial and anti-oxidant which allow it works as a decent skin
protection from irritation.
Since
beeswax
carries extreme benefits to cosmetics, I must vote it as the best wax ever!
