A biochemist on how sunscreen lets your own biology repair sun damage, what the evidence supports. Plus whether you actually need it indoors, by your phone or computer, or when the UV index is zero.
Excellent summary, but wondering why you don't mention the importance of DNA Repair enzymes in topical skincare, which is very helpful in repairing the DNA mutations that you speak about. I consider these almost as imporrtant as sunscreen.
You’re such a brilliant writer Marina! I’m always mind blown by how you simplify such technical details in concrete metaphors! Understanding the mechanism is what convinces me as well! ❤️❤️
Hi: I need help from people who love science! Can data center cooling loops recycle electricity from condensation as MIT's groundbreaking 2013 experiments suggest?
As data centers face an unprecedented energy and cooling crisis driven by AI infrastructure, billions are being spent on managing thermal phase changes—specifically evaporation and condensation.
In my latest work at Decoding Science, I’ve outlined a simple backyard citizen-scientist experiment that suggests we fundamentally misunderstand electron behavior during these phase changes. Standard solid-state models predict a neutral net current during condensation on these surfaces, but geometric manipulation reveals a measurable electrical anomaly.
If this anomaly scales, it means the massive humidity and condensation loops already running inside data center cooling infrastructure could be harnessed to harvest electricity directly from waste heat. Perhaps equally significant is how understanding evaporation will facilitate the cooling process.
I’ve laid out the simple, reproducible experiment to prove this effect. Would you be interested in a brief look at how rethinking electron kinetics during condensation could impact the future of data center efficiency?
Hi, I wanted to thank you for writing such informative articles! They really convinced me to use sunscreen every day and to get into retinal :). Also I was wondering whether you could go into what happens, when you stop using retinal, for example. In one of your posts you said that the work is still there but also that not using it will reverse it? I don’t want to be binded to using it forever so I was wondering what would happen if I started and then stopped using it. Will the skin just be as if you never used it? Will something work worse? Thanks again for your work, sadly I can’t afford subscriptions on social media (college student ;( ) but if I could I definitely would! Habe a great day!!
Hello and thank you for a wonderful post once again. Question: is a good amount of sunscreen + one layer of foundation the same protection as a tinted sunscreen? I’m a black woman with hyperpigmentation but I can’t find a tinted sunscreen that matches my skin tone.
So, if you got stuck in the US and needed to buy sunscreen which ones would you pick? And yes, thank you. I’ve been wearing sunscreen on my face for decades (70+ yo). I just had cataract surgery and a couple of the staff told me I had beautiful skin. I had a basal and a squamous cancer removed (shoulder and thigh) over a year ago. I’m super careful about sun these days.
About UV index - I’ve heard other things. Dr Sam Ellis said that there’s no need to wear sunscreen when UVI = 0. And I watched a YouTube video by Dr Wong (Labmuffin) in which she showed how UVA actually changes drastically throughout the day and year. The title of the video is ‘Do you need to wear sunscreen indoors? An analysis’. Would love to hear your response since I respect your opinion so much!
Thank you! I don’t think we’re actually disagreeing 🙂
Dr Ellis is right for what the UV index is for ( unless I am thinking about a different post ). it’s basically a sunburn/skin-cancer measure, so when your app shows 0 the burn-and-cancer risk really is gone (the guidelines say don’t bother below 3 anyway). But that the number is the erythemal value, which barely counts UVA, so a 0 on the app tells you the sunburn UV is gone, not that UVA is. In winter daylight especially, the index can read 0 while there’s still a bit of UVA hanging around that it just doesn’t reflect. So I think she’s answering the sunburn question.
Michelle’s post actually backs me up here. UVA does change through the day and year, just way less than UVB, so in winter UVB drops off a cliff while UVA barely budges, which makes it a bigger slice of the (smaller) total. And since the UV index is really just a sunburn/UVB measure, it doesn’t show you that UVA at all.
So it’s not that anyone’s wrong, I just think it’s more that we’re answering different questions. The index is about burning and skin cancer, whereas I’m talking about the UVA that quietly drives ageing and pigmentation. At a real UVI of 0 ( sun below the horizon, night, deep polar winter ) you can skip it. When the index merely reads 0 in winter daylight, UVB is near zero but there can still be residual UVA the number isn’t reflecting, which is exactly the blind spot I’m flagging.
Thank you! Well I guess I’ll have to get even better at applying sunscreen then. 😌 It’s just that the UVA graph looked so similar to the UVB one in her video. They’re both at around zero in Dec-Jan.
Excellent summary, but wondering why you don't mention the importance of DNA Repair enzymes in topical skincare, which is very helpful in repairing the DNA mutations that you speak about. I consider these almost as imporrtant as sunscreen.
I was going to ask the same question - learned about them from you!
You’re such a brilliant writer Marina! I’m always mind blown by how you simplify such technical details in concrete metaphors! Understanding the mechanism is what convinces me as well! ❤️❤️
Hi: I need help from people who love science! Can data center cooling loops recycle electricity from condensation as MIT's groundbreaking 2013 experiments suggest?
As data centers face an unprecedented energy and cooling crisis driven by AI infrastructure, billions are being spent on managing thermal phase changes—specifically evaporation and condensation.
In my latest work at Decoding Science, I’ve outlined a simple backyard citizen-scientist experiment that suggests we fundamentally misunderstand electron behavior during these phase changes. Standard solid-state models predict a neutral net current during condensation on these surfaces, but geometric manipulation reveals a measurable electrical anomaly.
If this anomaly scales, it means the massive humidity and condensation loops already running inside data center cooling infrastructure could be harnessed to harvest electricity directly from waste heat. Perhaps equally significant is how understanding evaporation will facilitate the cooling process.
I’ve laid out the simple, reproducible experiment to prove this effect. Would you be interested in a brief look at how rethinking electron kinetics during condensation could impact the future of data center efficiency?
Best regards,
Thomas Alan White
Hi, I wanted to thank you for writing such informative articles! They really convinced me to use sunscreen every day and to get into retinal :). Also I was wondering whether you could go into what happens, when you stop using retinal, for example. In one of your posts you said that the work is still there but also that not using it will reverse it? I don’t want to be binded to using it forever so I was wondering what would happen if I started and then stopped using it. Will the skin just be as if you never used it? Will something work worse? Thanks again for your work, sadly I can’t afford subscriptions on social media (college student ;( ) but if I could I definitely would! Habe a great day!!
Hello and thank you for a wonderful post once again. Question: is a good amount of sunscreen + one layer of foundation the same protection as a tinted sunscreen? I’m a black woman with hyperpigmentation but I can’t find a tinted sunscreen that matches my skin tone.
So, if you got stuck in the US and needed to buy sunscreen which ones would you pick? And yes, thank you. I’ve been wearing sunscreen on my face for decades (70+ yo). I just had cataract surgery and a couple of the staff told me I had beautiful skin. I had a basal and a squamous cancer removed (shoulder and thigh) over a year ago. I’m super careful about sun these days.
Thank you for a great post 😊
About UV index - I’ve heard other things. Dr Sam Ellis said that there’s no need to wear sunscreen when UVI = 0. And I watched a YouTube video by Dr Wong (Labmuffin) in which she showed how UVA actually changes drastically throughout the day and year. The title of the video is ‘Do you need to wear sunscreen indoors? An analysis’. Would love to hear your response since I respect your opinion so much!
Thank you! I don’t think we’re actually disagreeing 🙂
Dr Ellis is right for what the UV index is for ( unless I am thinking about a different post ). it’s basically a sunburn/skin-cancer measure, so when your app shows 0 the burn-and-cancer risk really is gone (the guidelines say don’t bother below 3 anyway). But that the number is the erythemal value, which barely counts UVA, so a 0 on the app tells you the sunburn UV is gone, not that UVA is. In winter daylight especially, the index can read 0 while there’s still a bit of UVA hanging around that it just doesn’t reflect. So I think she’s answering the sunburn question.
Michelle’s post actually backs me up here. UVA does change through the day and year, just way less than UVB, so in winter UVB drops off a cliff while UVA barely budges, which makes it a bigger slice of the (smaller) total. And since the UV index is really just a sunburn/UVB measure, it doesn’t show you that UVA at all.
So it’s not that anyone’s wrong, I just think it’s more that we’re answering different questions. The index is about burning and skin cancer, whereas I’m talking about the UVA that quietly drives ageing and pigmentation. At a real UVI of 0 ( sun below the horizon, night, deep polar winter ) you can skip it. When the index merely reads 0 in winter daylight, UVB is near zero but there can still be residual UVA the number isn’t reflecting, which is exactly the blind spot I’m flagging.
Thank you! Well I guess I’ll have to get even better at applying sunscreen then. 😌 It’s just that the UVA graph looked so similar to the UVB one in her video. They’re both at around zero in Dec-Jan.