Posts Tagged ‘under-eye circles’

February 9th, 2015 by Dr. Hannah Sivak

The basics The color of our skin is partly due to the pigment called melanin. Other factors are the content of diet carotenoids, the bluish-white color of connective tissue, and the abundance of blood vessels in the dermis and the color of blood flowing in them (oxy- and deoxy-hemoglobin). Other minor pigments (minor unless you have a bruise) are bilirubin (the yellow hemoglobin degradation product that colors bruises) and the complete sequence, which includes hemoglobin to biliverdin to bilirubin to hemosiderin. The different skin colors among individuals and races do not reflect major variation in numbers or size of melanocytes, but rather different kinds and amounts of melanin produced by…