Jojoba Benefit: Unsurpassed Multifunctionality

The best solution for dry skin is now flowing from jojoba trees in our hottest, driest deserts. It is highly effective jojoba oil. Nature took millions of years to perfect jojoba, a unique array of liquid wax esters that are almost identical to those of our own skin. As we mature beyond early adulthood, our skin produces less and less lipids, resulting in wrinkles and more fragile drier skin. Jojoba's rapid absorption just deep enough into the skin's surface layer (stratum corneum) provides all-day moisturization that leaves the skin feeling soft and smooth. Nature has perfected only one ideal ester replacement for us...that is Pure Natural Jojoba (PNJ). Jojoba functionality is now widely known.

Jojoba Benefit: Semi-occlusive Moisture Control

Jojoba and the skin's sebum are completely miscible. They form a non-greasy, non-tacky layer with exceptional transepidermal water control. The value of jojoba's precise non-occlusive moisture control is evident. Occlusive materials such as lanolin, mineral oil and petrolatum can cause micro-inflammation and anaerobic microbial growth in and around pores with subsequent off-odor. Maintenance of water permeability is also important in the stratum corneum repair response. Long-acting moisture control is only one of the qualities that make natural jojoba oil an increasingly attractive ingredient for both formulators and today's careful consumers. Jojoba efficacy has become well established.

Jojoba Benefit: Skin and Hair Emolliency

Jojoba gives a unique favorable texture to the skin. Unacceptable glare and greasy feel is suppressed. Jojoba is the closest thing to the human skin and has an excellent natural afterfeel. Jojoba spreads well, does not shine, is moist to touch makes the skin softer, smoother and reduces fine-line wrinkles.

As sebum production decreases, hair can become brittle and weak. Jojoba reconditions hair follicles and shafts for natural luster and shine. If sebum production is excessive, hair follicles can become blocked and hair can also become too dry and breakable. Jojoba dissolves excess sebum and allows pores to transpire normally. It can also dissolve sticky residue from hair products and airborne pollutants.

 

Jojoba History

Jojoba History in a Nutshell

Over millions of years wild jojoba trees have adapted to only one place in the world, the extremely hot and dry Sonora Desert of North America. In the 1700s, Father Junipero Sierra, who established the missions in California, wrote in his diary that Native Americans used the rich material they pressed from jojoba seeds for its 'mystical" treatment of cuts, scrapes, sunburn and dried out skin.

In 1934 University of Arizona chemists discovered that jojoba was the only natural source of liquid wax esters, other than the sperm whale oil. They were amazed that jojoba oil contains a 98% pure array of monounsaturated liquid wax esters consisting of long chains of fatty acids and alcohols, whereas all other seed oils consist of branched triglyceride molecules.

In the 1960-70s more attention became focused on protecting our environment and on replacing our limited supply of petrochemicals with sustainable production of renewable resources. The sperm whale, whose spermacti oil is 85% esters, had long been used in hundreds of cosmetic and lubrication products until these whales became an endangered species and jojoba was rediscovered as a replacement.

Then in the 1970s and 80s, when 46,500 acres of commercially planted jojoba trees in the southwestern United States began producing a few hundred drums of Natural Jojoba seed extract, America's first new crop in over 100 years was born. Associations were formed, public and private research flourished, technologies and markets were developed, but much had to be learned by trial and error and most of those first jojoba pioneers failed. Since then, others have attempted to grow jojoba in more than 30 countries, but most of them have also failed.

Never-the-less, by 2005 the fledgling worldwide jojoba industry annually produced over 10,000 drums of Natural Jojoba extract. This exquisite ingredient is already used in a multitude of personal care products and as jojoba's unique functionality excites more new chemists, many more new products are being formulated with these elegant esters.

At Purcell Jojoba, we believe that as awareness of petrochemical shortages and related environmental challenges increases, jojoba utilization for many bio-based products will lead to a much larger jojoba industry in the near future. Growing more jojoba trees will help save precious desert water, help sustain farming in our rural communities and provide a new highly functional, non-petroleum lubricant.