UV nail polish dryers lead to cancer-causing mutation

UV lamps used to dry nail polish, also known as shellac or gel manicures, can cause harm to human cells, including DNA damage and mutations associated with skin cancers.

Researchers at the University of California San Diego tested the effect of UV lamps used for drying gel nails on different types of cell lines and found that both acute and chronic use causes damage to the cells. The findings, published in Nature Communications, suggest that chronic use of these machines could pose a potential health risk.

Dr Ludmil Alexandrov, associate professor of cellular and molecular medicine at UC San Diego, and corresponding author of the study said: 'If you look at the way these devices are presented, they are marketed as safe, with nothing to be concerned about. But to the best of our knowledge, no one has actually studied these devices and how they affect human cells at the molecular and cellular levels until now.'

While it has been established that UV radiation from tanning beds causes cancer in humans, it is not clear what the effect of using UV lamps for drying gel nail polish is. Tanning beds emit UV light on a wide spectrum of 280-400nm, while UV lamps used for drying nail polish emit UV light at 340-395nm and have been less well studied.

The researchers exposed three types of cell lines – adult human skin keratinocytes, human foreskin fibroblasts and mouse embryonic fibroblasts – to different levels of UV lamp exposure.

In the acute exposure scenario, the cells were radiated under a UV lamp for 20 minutes, then allowed to repair or return to their steady state for one hour, before being radiated for a further 20 minutes. In this setting, 20 to 30 percent of cells died.

In the chronic scenario, the cells were exposed to UV light for 20 minutes on three consecutive days, resulting in 65 to 70 percent of cells dying. In both chronic and acute exposure settings, the remaining cells showed signs of increased levels of reactive oxygen species molecules and resulting mitochondrial and DNA damage reminiscent of patterns of mutations observed in skin cancer.

'Our experimental results and the prior evidence strongly suggest that radiation emitted by UV-nail polish dryers may cause cancers of the hand and that UV-nail polish dryers, similar to tanning beds, may increase the risk of early-onset skin cancer.' said the authors of the study.

'Nevertheless, future large-scale epidemiological studies are warranted to accurately quantify the risk for skin cancer of the hand in people regularly using UV-nail polish dryers. It is likely that such studies will take at least a decade to complete and to subsequently inform the general public'.