THE BIOLOGY OF SKIN
Dear HIW,
How much melanin determines our bodies’ skin pigmentation?
Shathiswaran R.
Melanin plays a core role in determining our pigmentation. This substance is responsible for producing the colour of our hair, eyes and skin, and the more of it that’s produced, the darker these features will appear. The amount of melanin our bodies make isn’t decided by chance, but involves genetics and how much Sun exposure you have.
Melanin plays a vital part in protecting us from the Sun’s radiation. The substance absorbs its ultraviolet (UV) rays to protect our cells from damage. Three different types of melanin make up our bodies’ pigmentation. Eumelanin can be black or brown in colour and produces darkness in eyes, skin and hair.
Pheomelanin produces the pinker pigments that can be seen in areas such as the lips and nipples, and neuromelanin controls the colour of neurons, which you can’t see. Everyone has a similar number of the cells that produce melanin, but these cells produce different amounts of melanin in each person. The combination of eumelanin and pheomelanin produced determines the colours we can see on our bodies. Some people are born with clusters of melanin-producing cells – this displays as freckles.