 How to eat your sunscreen. You probably heard me say vitamin D is important and while this is true You still need to protect your skin from getting too much sun. First off beta-carotene Beta-carotene is a nutrient that can aid in the maintenance of your skin health. Fun fact It's also one of the carotenoids that give fruits and vegetables like mango carrots and sweet potatoes. They're natural colors Now beta-carotene produces vitamin A activity in your body It's also acting as a plant-derived photo protector. In other words, it acts as a natural sunscreen for your skin Now what should you eat to get beta-carotene? I'll tell you right now Raw carrots are a great source Sweet potatoes are a great source and leafy greens like kale and spinach. Now number two Omega-3 fatty acids are the healthy fats that are essential for your skin protection They maintain healthy cell membranes helping to fight DNA changes due to skin exposure Now some great sources of omega-3 fatty acids you probably well know by now wild-caught salmon flax seeds walnuts hemp seeds organic canola oil and Perilla oil are all great sources Another fun fact it turns out that farm-raised trout not farm-raised salmon Actually convert their omega-6 feeds into Omega-3s So if you see farm-raised trout on a menu or sometimes you'll see it at Costco Don't be afraid to buy it But if you see Atlantic salmon or farm-raised salmon run the other direction Okay, astaxanthin So astaxanthin has been shown to have wonderful photo protective effects You can get astaxanthin in your diet by eating algae So spirulina, chlorella, great sources of astaxanthin Wild-caught salmon that color in wild-caught salmon is astaxanthin And they're now a number of supplements that are readily available to get astaxanthin How about fern block? Fern block is actually polypodium leukotomus It's a plant protective property. There's very photo protective Fern block is an all-natural antioxidant extract. It's used both topically on the skin and can be taken orally It helps protect our skin cells from UV damage and supports an increase in skin collagen Hyaluronic acid production and elastin. A major part of its photo protective properties rely on its antioxidant properties due to its high phenolic content. And in fact it has tons of Polyphenols which will change your gut bacteria for the better Timed release vitamin C is the next one Now interestingly enough vitamin C Repairs damage to collagen. Vitamin C unfortunately is not readily available Shortly after you take it. Oral vitamin C only lasts a couple of hours in our blood That's why I really recommend people take time to release vitamin C about a thousand milligrams twice a day Interestingly the reason smokers have such sun damage and wrinkles is because their vitamin C is all used up by the oxidative stress that smoking gives to them and the reason the smokers have so much Wrinkles and sun damage is they don't have the vitamin C that's necessary for repair now next up is Foods that have high levels of egalic acid egalic acid has Wonderful photo protective effects when it comes to collagen breakdown redness and swelling in Irritated human skin cells so to get the benefit of egalic acid You should be eating pomegranates in season not just pomegranate juice folks much too much sugar Strawberries in season raspberries in season and blackberries in season next up dark mushrooms Turns out that dark mushrooms contain a lots of melanin now Most of you know what melanin is melanin is what gives the dark pigmentation to our skin and melanin exists to Absorb UV light so the more melanin you eat believe it or not the more that's Transmitted into more melaton to protect you from UV exposure So don't hesitate to get more of the darker mushrooms into your diet Leave the white button mushrooms alone get the brown mushrooms the crimini mushroom Portobello mushrooms are a great dark mushroom that are now available in almost all grocery stores I've got a great portobello mushroom pizza recipe on YouTube now one more thing I'll add when your skin is exposed to the Sun it Produces vitamin D and you actually want that to happen Vitamin D promotes calcium absorption from your gut it enables Mineralization of the bone and it's also very essential to prevent low calcium in your bloodstream and vitamin D Production is necessary to actually grow bones So the last thing you want to do is block vitamin D Production from sunlight once again another really important reason and one of the most famous dermatologist perhaps infamous dermatologist Dr. Hollick from Boston University was one of the first dermatologists to actually tell people to get their vitamin D levels from sun exposure and Long story short he got into a lot of trouble But luckily got reinstated and now we know that sunlight is not as bad for you as you once thought If you can't get enough sunlight to get your vitamin D's up and most people can't I recommend most adults take 5,000 international units a day the University of California, San Diego Recommends that the average American take 10,000 international units a day for protection Make sure to check out the next one here if you want to produce atherosclerosis heart disease in monkeys You feed them peanut oil