Antioxidant and anti-inflammatory effects of shungite on UVB-stressed skin

Sajo and Kim explored how a shungite extract protects skin from UVB-induced oxidative stress and inflammation. Treated subjects showed reduced skin damage compared with untreated controls.

Sources: via verifiedshungite.com · original on Consensus .

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A 2019 review in a clinical-pharmacology journal - led by L.B. Piotrovsky, a long-standing fullerene-pharmacology researcher - names shungite directly in the context of skin protection:

"природный минерал шунгит содержит не фуллерены, а турбостратный углерод, который может нейтрализовывать действие УФ-облучения на кожу"
"the natural mineral shungite contains not fullerenes but turbostratic carbon, which can neutralise the effect of UV irradiation on the skin."

It's a useful clarification of the mechanism behind this thread: the review credits the UV-protective action to shungite's turbostratic carbon structure (its disordered, partly-graphene carbon), rather than to fullerene content specifically. The same review catalogues how far the broader fullerene-cosmetics field has gone - UV/photoaging protection, an 8-week acne gel, ~18% pore reduction, hair-growth stimulation. Shungite sits at the natural-source end of that same carbon-antioxidant story.

Source

- Piotrovsky L.B., Litasova E.V., Dumpis M.A. (2019), "Зачем нам сегодня нужны фуллерены?", Обзоры по клинической фармакологии и лекарственной терапии: cyberleninka.ru

Worth pulling the actual measured results out of this study (Sajo et al., Oxidative Medicine and Cellular Longevity, 2017), because they're more concrete than the headline suggests - and the application method surprises people.

How it was applied

Topically, as a shungite suspension in olive oil (~200 µg/mL, 200 µL on the skin), once daily for 7 days on UVB-exposed hairless mice. Not shungite water - shungite particles in oil, rubbed on like a cream.

What it measured

- Visible skin: significant reduction in roughness, pigmentation and wrinkling; moisture and elasticity improved versus the UV-only group
- Antioxidant enzymes: SOD (superoxide dismutase) up, and GPx (glutathione peroxidase) up in both blood serum and skin tissue
- Oxidative load: ROS/RNS (reactive oxygen and nitrogen species) reduced in the skin
- Inflammation: the pro-inflammatory cytokines IL-1β, IL-6 and TNF-α all came down
- Cell signalling: increased activation (phosphorylation) of Nrf2, p38 MAPK and JNK - Nrf2 being the master switch cells use to turn on their own antioxidant defences

Why it's worth knowing

This isn't a folk claim - it's a controlled animal study in a peer-reviewed journal, showing topical shungite both raised the skin's own antioxidant enzymes and lowered the inflammatory signals after UV damage. The Nrf2 activation is the tell: the rock didn't just sit there mopping up radicals, it appears to have switched on the skin's built-in defence pathway.

Source

- Sajo M.E.J., Kim C.-S., Kim S.-K., Shim K.Y., Kang T.-Y., Lee K.-J. (2017), "Antioxidant and Anti-Inflammatory Effects of Shungite against Ultraviolet B Irradiation-Induced Skin Damage in Hairless Mice", Oxidative Medicine and Cellular Longevity 2017:7340143: pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov