I’ve always insisted that if you want effective skin care with innovative ingredients at reasonable prices, then you should explore the world of Korean-founded beauty. I felt validated in my belief when I reported on a unique serum that was rapidly growing in popularity due to the inclusion of one anti-aging ingredient: polydeoxyribonucleotide, or PDRN for short.
PDRN, we learned from board-certified dermatopathologist and skin care brand founder, Dr. Gretchen Frieling, is a portion of DNA that’s typically derived from salmon sperm (you may have heard a similarly-named facial invoked by members of the Kardashian family and their ilk) and is widely used in regenerative and functional medicine, especially in Korea.
“PDRN has been shown to accelerate repair of damaged skin and promote new tissue growth,” Frieling said. “It also boosts hydration in the skin, promotes cellular turnover and reduces hyperpigmentation.”
This could be the reason we are seeing the recent boom in PDRN-containing products available over the counter — products exactly like the earlier-mentioned Iope PDRN Caffeine Shot serum, which immediately became a favorite among HuffPost readers. Since then, the PDRN product market has expanded to include formulations like the ones featured in the collection below, many of which have been recommended to us by Frieling, Dr. Dara Spearman, and others.
