Spirulina: The “Blue-Green” Secret Behind Youthful Skin

Summary

Episode Overview

Podcast: Biohacking Beauty: The Anti-Aging Skincare Podcast
Hosts: Anastasia & Amitai (Co-founders of Yangu Skincare)
Episode Title: Spirulina: The “Blue-Green” Secret Behind Youthful Skin
Release Date: October 10, 2025
Main Theme:
A focused, in-depth exploration of spirulina as a skincare ingredient—especially in the context of the new Blue Peptide Spray formula. The hosts answer staff-submitted questions, demystifying spirulina’s benefits, use, and science for skin health and anti-aging.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

What is Spirulina and Why is It Special?

• Spirulina is a blue-green algae celebrated for its “nutrient density” (02:58).
• It's loaded with peptides, amino acids, and antioxidants, making it a popular ingredient for high-impact skincare where “every molecule counts” (03:05).
• Unique Selling Point: The specific spirulina extract used (Spirulina AP) is heavy metal-free—crucial because traditional spirulina may absorb heavy metals from its environment (03:30).

Anti-Aging and Skin Health Benefits

• Main Peptide: Phycocyanin—signals for increased hydration, acts as a powerful antioxidant/anti-inflammatory, and supports collagen production due to its amino acid richness (04:09).
• Mineral Content: Rich in magnesium (muscle relaxation, skin absorption, stress-relief) and iron (defense against pollution, blue light) (04:55).

Mechanism—How Spirulina Fights Aging

• Multifaceted Action:
  • Scavenges free radicals (antioxidant action)
  • Reduces inflammation
  • Stimulates collagen production and prevents its breakdown both actively (building) and passively (protecting)
  • Provides vital minerals that reduce depletion (05:44, 06:27)
• Quote:
  • “Peptides are just codes... like computer codes for our skin” (04:16, Amitai)

Soothing & Sensitivity Considerations

• Potential for Irritation: Poorly processed spirulina can irritate the skin; however, properly formulated, heavy metal–free spirulina calms redness and is good for rosacea (07:22).

UV Protection & Repair

• Spirulina’s pigment gives it some ability to absorb UV and to help repair UV-induced damage by fighting oxidative stress (08:00).

Spirulina for Acne

• Key Benefits: Anti-inflammatory and antimicrobial actions make it valuable for acne-prone skin, as it calms inflammation and reduces p. acnes bacteria (08:32).

Skin Brightening & Hydration

• Contributes to breaking down melanin clusters for a modest “brightening” effect—not as potent as vitamin C but supportive (09:13).
• Boosts hydration from within (09:41).

Oral vs. Topical Spirulina

• Topical is Superior for Skin:
  • Oral spirulina’s antioxidant properties benefit the whole body, so effects on the skin are not pronounced.
  • “If you want to see these properties… it has to be applied topically.” (11:12, Amitai)

Best Use & Frequency

• No need to cycle—can be used daily or even twice daily.
• Not photosensitizing; best use may be in the morning due to strong antioxidant power (12:51, 13:08, Anastasia).

Side Effects & Cautions

• May cause irritation in those allergic to algae (13:30).
• Key: Only use products with proper testing and certification for purity and heavy metal absence (13:42).

How to Select Quality Spirulina Skincare

• Avoid extremely cheap spirulina products—questionable quality/testing (13:53).
• Prefer patented/trademarked forms like “Spirulina AP” with clinical backing, made by reputable manufacturers (14:08).

Is Spirulina a Trend or Mainstay?

• Spirulina is not a fleeting trend, but a “blue-green evergreen” in skincare—recognized and used for years globally (14:39).

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Peptides:

  • “Peptides are just codes... like computer codes for our skin, for that matter, for our body to do different things.”
    — Amitai (04:16)

• On Safety:

  • “It needs to be heavy metal free, which would also be irritating.”
    — Amitai (07:24)
  • “If you see like an uber cheap formulation with spirulina, I would just second guess their testing.”
    — Anastasia (13:53)

• On Versatility:

  • “I think it’s like an evergreen in this fight, because it’s also green. Actually, blue-green—ever blue-green.”
    — Anastasia (15:27)

• On Usage:

  • “Spirulina… it’s not one of those actives that you need to, like, cycle… You can use it daily, you could use it twice a day if you want.”
    — Anastasia (12:51)

• Humorous:

  • “The joke was every time you say the word algae, she pops out from somewhere.” (Energy Bits founder reference)
    — Amitai (02:43)
  • “If it’s delivered by Uber too…” (about cheap spirulina)
    — Amitai (14:05)

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Important Segment Timestamps

• 00:00–01:20 — Introduction & context for staff Q&A bonus episodes
• 01:20–02:55 — Explaining spirulina and focus of this deep-dive
• 02:55–04:01 — Nutrient makeup and importance of heavy metal testing
• 04:01–06:19 — Spirulina’s anti-aging mechanisms: peptides, antioxidants, inflammation, collagen, minerals
• 07:02–07:52 — Soothing/calming vs. potential irritation; product formulation importance
• 08:00–08:32 — UV protection and damage repair
• 08:32–09:01 — Acne: inflammation and anti-bacterial properties
• 09:13–09:56 — Brightening and hydration
• 10:06–11:23 — Oral vs. topical use — when/why to use which, user experience
• 12:01–13:25 — Best frequency and time of day for topical spirulina
• 13:30–13:42 — Potential side effects and allergy caution
• 13:42–14:34 — How to select quality spirulina products
• 14:39–15:38 — Is it a trend or staple? The “ever blue-green” analogy
• 15:43–17:14 — Closing thoughts, product mentions, and how to find spirulina in Young Goose products

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Conclusion

This episode delivers a science-backed, practical guide to spirulina as a skincare ingredient—clearing up myths, highlighting safe usage, and setting realistic expectations for users interested in anti-aging biohacks. The tone is friendly, conversational, and slightly humorous, with actionable takeaways for both skincare enthusiasts and curious newcomers.

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For further exploration:

• Deeper dive on oral spirulina and Energy Bits with earlier episodes (see show archive).
• More ingredient-focused Q&A episodes promised for the future—listeners invited to submit questions.

Transcript

[A]

Foreign welcome to Biohacking Beauty Podcast, the podcast that marries science, longevity and beauty all in one show.

[B]

Where are your hosts? My name is Anastasia.

[A]

My name is Amitai. Co founders of Yangu Skincare. Today we're doing something new special that's the first time we are going to actually take questions from our own staff, from our own employees. We're launching a new product called Blue Peptide Spray and our employees had questions about the different ingredients that are in the formulations. So we took some times and we wanted to record little bonus episodes on each of the ingredients and the questions that were asked. So, yeah, you know, if, if you liked, if you liked that, I'm just going to remind people, you can go to yangus.com use code podcast10 get 10% off your purchase. Yeah, yeah. So let's start. What are we talking about? So Blue Peptide Spray has cool ingredients. We are starting with.

[B]

Well, I think this episode will only focus on spirulina and we already recorded a longer format episode that by this time is already available where there is a deeper dive. But in that episode we kind of focused mostly on methylene blue because that's the hero ingredient in our newly launched Blue Peptide Spray. But there are other cool ingredients and we just briefly touched on them and this is more of a deeper dive again coming from our staff questions and you know, if they're asking questions, we figured everyone is wondering the same things.

[A]

Getting you behind the scenes. So today we're going to talk about Spirulina ap, which is a branded name of a spirulina extract. So we're going to be talking about spirulina.

[B]

Yeah. And how spirulina's benefits translate into skin health. Back in the day, if you guys scroll to like three years ago of this podcast, you had the founder of the spirulina company, Energy Bits. Energy Bits, yeah. So if you want even deeper dive, you can scroll back, find that episode and you'll get convinced. Spirulina is everything that basically helps you function and cures everything on, on earth. But there are.

[A]

The joke was, it's that every time you say the word algae, she pops out from somewhere.

[B]

Yes, yes. But spirulina does have a pretty cool properties for skin health. So this is it.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Do you want to talk about what is spirulina? Maybe some people don't know.

[A]

Yeah. So spirulina is a green blue algae that is unique in its basically in its nutrient density. So anything from, you know, peptides, amino acids, antioxidants, it's rich in all of those. And therefore it's a, it's a really good ingredient to use in skincare where, you know, every gram, every molecule counts. You need really high impact ingredients because you have a limited amount of space in each formulation. And on the other hand, because, because of the way that it kind of builds itself and the environments that it lives in. It also unfortunately is a lot of times rich in heavy metals. So one of the things that's good spirulina is being tested for is that heavy metal composition and deposition. And spirulina AP is heavy metal free, which is kind of cool and important.

[B]

Yeah, no, super important. Okay, so how does spirulina fight aging?

[A]

So it has a really cool peptide which is called phycocyanin peptide, which is mainly signaling hydration. I think a lot of times people hear peptides and they think wrinkles or I don't. They think, you see on Instagram like the, the, some, some definitely funded post saying oh, peptides tackle and they're going to tackle something. But the reality is peptides are just codes. They're like computer codes for our skin, for that matter, for our body to do different things. So these specific peptides, what they are doing is first they're antioxidant and anti inflammatory, but they really improve hydration. Again, rich in amino acids that do support collagen production. And it also has very important minerals like magnesium and iron. We know iron is very good to defend against free, I mean, against blue light, against pollution, things like that. Magnesium is extremely important. It's one of the ingredients to actually relax muscles. So yeah, you look good after you have more magnesium absorbed through your skin. And magnesium actually is really good at absorbing through the skin.

[B]

Yeah, there's so many magnesium creams.

[A]

Yes, exactly.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And you know, zestine salt is rich in magnesium and that's what you use in your, in your bath. And that's what we use also with live. Yeah, with our baby.

[B]

For sure.

[A]

So you asked how it, how it fights aging. So first and foremost, I mean we talk a lot about the fact that free radicals or oxidative stress is one of those most primary, you know, things that go wrong in the skin and that a lot of different types of skin aging go from that. So it, it's scavenges for free radicals, but it also lowers, as we said, inflammation. So it lowers inflammation. That's always fights aging and also helps with collagen production. Make sure we're again not mineral depleted.

[B]

Yeah, very cool. Okay, well does it support collagen? That's what people really care about?

[A]

Usually, yes. It's also. It does two things. So it supports collagen actively because of amino acids, but it also prevents collagen degradation through that blocking of the inflammatory and oxidative stress buildup. So it does both. It's both passive and active. You know, sometimes I think of it like a car. A car can be two things. It can be resilient when you crash, it can protect you, but it can also not get into an accident because it's quick. It's both active and passive in its defense. If you would. So similar here.

[B]

All right. When I hear spirulina, I imagine something natural and it's so green and green kind of like associates with something like aloe vera. Very calming, very soothing. Does spirulina have any kind of soothing properties? Maybe like calming redness? You already said inflammation.

[A]

Yeah, there's a problem there because spirulina, as a rule, actually as an ingredient, it may be irritating there. You really need to know how to formulate with it. And again, it needs to be heavy metal free, which would also be irritating. Having said that, yes, if it's formulated in a way that's non irritating and heavy metal free, it will calm redness. It's really good for people with rosacea, things like that.

[B]

Nice.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Okay, well, does it have any other properties, like maybe UV protection?

[A]

Yes. So the pigment in spirulina helps absorb uv, so it has some active again, some preventative aspect, but also therapeutic aspect because it helps repair the damage. Oxidative stress, which was created by UV is wreaking havoc in the skin, if you would. So, yeah. So I want to ask you a few questions. What do you say? First question I have, can spirulina help with acne?

[B]

Yes. So spirulina has those very much needed anti inflammatory properties to calm acne because acne patients always battle inflammation as well. That's part of acne outbreak. And on the other hand, it's also very antimicrobial and antibacterial and those properties also help, you know, diminish p. Acne bacteria outbreaks and growth. So yeah, it's very good for acne patients.

[A]

Great. And you know, it's funny because we say a lot, you don't see acne, you see the inflammation caused by acne. Right. So it's really cool. What about brightening?

[B]

Yeah. So spirulina actually has properties to help kind of like break down the melanin clusters. So it is very like, it's not going to be like, if you're looking for a specific brightening effect, it's not going to be as strong its brightening properties as, let's say, vitamin C. But it is very supportive of brightening. So in a complex, you could look at it as a brightening agent as well.

[A]

Nice. What about hydration?

[B]

Yeah, I think you mentioned that, that it's actually helps stimulate hydration from within your skin. So it's as, again, as an ingredient, one of its properties will be to boost hydration from the inside.

[A]

Nice. A lot of people, again, we mentioned that we had a very long deep dive on oral on edible spirulina.

[B]

Spirulina, yeah.

[A]

And chlorella. That was the episode.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

So is it better eaten or applied?

[B]

Yeah. And I think, yeah, if you want to get a second opinion on what I'm about to say, you can go and listen to that podcast. But when you consume spirulina, it, because of those many properties we talked about that it's such so potent and antioxidant and you have just oxidative stress all over your body, not just in your skin. Therefore, like when you consume it orally, your body will allocate these resources for some of other organs. It's not going to immediately show up in your skin. I personally think when I am diligent enough and I take my energy bits, which this podcast is not sponsored by, I feel better, but I don't see immediate reflection on my skin, which some other supplements do. And we recorded actually recently an episode about supplements that we take that help our skin from inside out. So you can refer to that podcast. We share everything we take and everything we find really helpful. But I wouldn't say spirulina like really shows up in my skin. So I think if you want to see this properties of spirulina we just talked about, it has to be applied topically.

[A]

Got it. So if you look a little bit green, it's not because of spirulina. Okay, so that's some. You know, I guess our employees weren't synced because there is a similar question, which is, is it better used in skincare or in smoothies? But it's. It's kind of the same, right?

[B]

Yeah, but, yeah, it's absolutely the same. But I will say that, yes, sometimes I don't like taking the spirulina, like chewing spirulina tablets and your mouth can kind of turn green. So. But in smoothies, it's fun. You get your green smoothie and you feel so good about it.

[A]

Best way to use spirulina for the skin.

[B]

I think it's this, I think it's the same question like we topically or like.

[A]

No, no, like how, how do you would use it daily?

[B]

Or, or yeah, I mean spirulina, it's not one of those Actives that you need to like cycle and we are also bio individual. So there. When you experiment with skincare, you, you, you can find that some Actives just do more miracles for your skin than others. So if you're somebody that tried the formulation with spirulina and you, you like just saw that, oh my God, you immediately look refreshed and renewed and, and it's really made an impact. You can use it daily there. Like you, it's not one of those ingredients that, you know, you have to kind of watch your intake. You can't do too much of it.

[A]

Yes, correct.

[B]

You could use it daily, you could use it twice a day if you want. It's not, it doesn't make your skin more photosensitive, so you don't have to do it only at night. But it is kind of like a great formulation for the day because of what Amitaya said earlier, that it has a strong antioxidant power. So it, you know, will be helpful when you go about your day and you know, outdoors and you meet pollution and free radicals and you know, so many things. So it kind of fight off that stress. So if you don't want to do it twice a day, I think morning is best used for spirulina products.

[A]

Yeah. Okay. So are there any side effects?

[B]

No. Well, you. Unless. Yeah, I was just about to say unless you're allergic to algae.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So then you shouldn't use it at all.

[A]

Yes. How to choose quality spirulina products?

[B]

Well, I think you already alluded to that Spirulina needs to go through rigorous testing and I think it's a little bit of like also logic. Aspirulina is not the most affordable ingredient. So if you see like an uber cheap formulation with spirulina, I would, would just second guess their, their, their testing.

[A]

But if it's delivered by Uber too.

[B]

And then, and then like for example, we use Spirit and ap. So it's a trademark compound and that's the compound that has clinical data behind it. It has testing. So just look for this particular compound could be in other formulations by other companies, you know, or similar to that that has clinical backing and it has like reputable manufacturer.

[A]

Yeah. I agree. Is Spirulina the next big skincare trend?

[B]

I don't think so. I don't think it's the next big skincare trend. If anything, I think Spirulina has been out for a while. More and more companies using that. I don't think there. There are some skincare companies from around the world that based their whole line on spirulina or I remember, even like skinceutical. I think like five years ago, they. They launched their phyto line and it has algae there. So again, it's been around. It has. It's one of those ingredients that kind of comes from like ancient cultures already figured out the properties of algae and now we're like learning from it and making it more mainstream, if you will. And again, I don't think it's one of those. I think it's like an evergreen in this fight because it's also green. It actually blue green ever blue green. I think it's here to stay. I think it's been around and it's not going anywhere.

[A]

Nice. Okay, so that's all we got for this episode.

[B]

And I think, as we mentioned before, these ingredients used prominently in our Blue Peptide spray. Do you want to shine the light on like Procare that we use it there as well?

[A]

No, I think, I think we can keep it short.

[B]

Yeah. I just wanted to say if you want to say where else they can find it besides Blue Peptide spray? Just Blue Peptide spray for now.

[A]

Peptide Spray, Pro Care and look for other products that have it too. Ladder has it.

[B]

Yep. Yeah, those are the three. So yeah, that's where maybe you're listening to this podcast and you already have.

[A]

Maybe you're listening to this product podcast in the future and where our entire company became a spirulina company. Who knows? Or not. Okay. Anyway, that was short and sweet.

[B]

Yes. Yes. So we'll be recording more of this kind of ingredient focused, short and sweet deep dives.

[A]

Yes. If you liked what you heard and you want to act now, you can go to young.com.

[B]

Yeah. You can tell us which ingredient you want us to highlight.

[A]

You can do that too. You can use podcast 10 and get 10 off your purchase. And.

[B]

And if you like the information we put out, we would appreciate a like and Review and review. 5 stars. 5 stars.

[A]

Give. Give us 5 stars. We mentioned Uber in this podcast, so along the lines of Uber. Anyway, thank you very much. We'll see you next time. Thank you. See you.

[B]

Thank you. Bye.

[A]

Sam.