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Cindy asks a winter inspired question from frigid Wisconsin where humectants are making the winter of 2014-2015 even more frustrating. You need to know that here in the Midwestern U.S.A. (like Wisconsin), winter tends to be very cold and very dry. So even when we see the outdoor humidity is, say, 50%, if the temperature is 10°F (-12°C), the air is still extremely dry and the dewpoint - that temperature indicating how much water the air could hold if it was fully saturated - could be below 0°F. That is desert-dry air. I zero in on glycerin because it can be a curly or wavy-haired person's dry-air nemesis. But I didn't leave many out, so read on. "Humectant" is a very broad category including salts, glycerin, plant gels like aloe vera or flax gel, algae extracts, hyaluronic acid, hydrolyzed proteins, sodium PCA, lactic acid, urea, witch hazel (without alcohol) and other ingredients that attract water. Not all humectants are "created" equal - different humectan...

This applies to white or gray, highlighted and blonde or light brown hair that may tend to become brassy or develop an unnatural color tint - yellow, red, orange or greenish. White hair has no pigment. Although sometimes that's not entirely the case as a hair turns white. And sometimes there's a dark medulla to add color. The lighter your hair overall, the more likely discoloration from any source will show. What causes yellowing of light-colored hair? Water chemistry: Hardness or natural minerals, chemicals used for water treatment, seasonal water chemistry changes all impact whether or not your water discolors your hair. For example, if your water source comes from lakes and rivers, it varies greatly (within drinkable limits) with changing seasons and the treatment needed to make the water safe to drink. Some water is high in iron which can give hair an orange, red or yellow cast. Other things in water (metals) can cause green or brown discoloration. Alkaline water can be al...

It's time to examine the float test for hair porosity more fully. I began looking into how the float test could give you an inaccurate result in the previous post . Elsewhere on this blog I have mentioned that this test is not very accurate. This post will show you why. To make the test more accurate, see the tips at the end of the post © Science-y Hair Blog 2 The idea behind the float test follows this line of thinking: If hair is porous, it takes on more water than if it is not porous. Therefore, porous hair might sink because it takes on water and becomes heavy. That is - the weight of the water the hair is absorbing overwhelms the power of surface tension (between water molecules) that keeps the hair suspended on top of the water. And in a sense this is not wrong but it is incomplete. But there are too many other variables in play to make this an accurate assessment of how porous your hair is by simply grabbing some hair and dropping it in a glass. Your experiment needs ...