PAVISE - New Sunscreen Technology with Sophie Bai, Michelle Yoswa

[Intro] Hey, everyone. Welcome to Facially Conscious. I'm Trina Renea, a medically-trained Master Esthetician here in Los Angeles, and I'm sitting with my rockstar co-host, Dr. Vicki Rapaport, a board-certified dermatologist with practices in Beverly Hills and Culver City, Rebecca Gadberry, our resident skincare scientist and regulatory and marketing expert, and Julie Falls, our educated consumer who is here to represent you. 

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Are you ready to discover the latest and greatest skincare secrets? Tune in and let us be your go-to girls for all things facially conscious. Let's dive in.

01:26 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: Good morning, everybody. Today, we are starting with a bang.

01:31 Trina Renea: Hello. Good morning. Ready for the bang.

01:35 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: Ready for the bang? Good. Well, welcome to the first Facially Conscious episode of 2024.

01:39 Trina Renea: Yes, which won't be released till later, this episode.

01:44 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: That's okay. And as I was saying today, we're starting with a bang with the newest, hottest, latest skincare product in my office, and that combines, you guessed it, sunscreen but with benefits.

It's called Pavise, and its captivating videos are all over social media. Today, we're going to be talking with the founder right now. Her name is Sophie Bai, and here is a little bit about Sophie.

Sophie is pretty impressive. She was selected to enroll in the National Science Program at the age of 14 to compete in science internationally on behalf of China. She discovered an anti-aging compound at the age of 16 and a minor planet. Yes, a planet. Planet number 25045 that was named after her by NASA and MIT Lincoln Laboratory to recognize her scientific accomplishment.

She studied chemical engineering with a focus on biomedical engineering at MIT where she worked with an Institute Professor, Robert Langer, developing various drug delivery technologies to find cures for prostate cancer, lung cancer and Type 1 diabetes.

Sophie has invented, co-invented and patented multiple proprietary molecules to provide cures and treatments for atopic dermatitis, which is another name for eczema, skin cancer and skin aging. 

She has her Bachelor's in Chemical Engineering from MIT and her business degree from Harvard Business School. 

A brief background on her entrepreneurial prowess, she founded PPEople First, a venture philanthropy vehicle that procured 20 million pieces of N95 respirators, surgical masks and medical gowns, face shields and gloves and donated it to 27 hospitals during the peak of COVID-19 in 2020.

She has advised pharmaceutical and beauty companies before starting her own company called B.A.I. Biosciences which launched her first breakthrough product, which we're going to talk about today. 

The product is called Pavise. I have it on right now. Welcome, Sophie.

03:54 Sophie Bai: Thank you, Dr. Rapaport for this extensive introduction.

03:59 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: Wildly deserved.

04:00 Julie Falls: All I can say is I was like on the beaches of Miami chasing boys while she was finding planets at 16. 

04:08 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: Right, but here we are all together. Isn't that the beauty of the world?

04:11 Trina Renea: So impressive, yes.

04:12 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: And also, we have the LA Pavise representative with us today who answers all of my day-to-day questions about Pavise for my staff with our incessant texts and emails. Her name is Michelle Yoswa. Welcome, Michelle.

04:28 Michelle Yoswa: Thank you, Dr. Rapaport. Nice to see you guys today.

04:31 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: Nice to see you. Welcome.

04:32 Trina Renea: Thanks for joining us. I'm so excited to learn about this new technology in sunscreen. The FDA has said that we can only, every two hours we have to reapply our sunscreen. This new technology is so fascinating. I'm so excited to hear about it and share it with all our listeners in the world.

04:57 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: Right. So, Sophie, can you please explain to the world what is Pavise? What is the science behind it?

05:05 Sophie Bai: Yeah. So Pavise actually is an ancient shield that soldiers used in the 14th Century to protect themselves. I think that's a very fitting name for us to think about not only just skin protection but also skin rejuvenation. 

You guys know the best that, without sun protection, nothing really works. That's where we decided to use this name as a brand.

05:35 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: Love that. Amazing. And I would say that you wanted to cure cancer. Tell us a little bit more about your background as a researcher and maybe how you decided to make the best sunscreen in the world.

05:51 Sophie Bai: Yeah. I'm a scientist. I started competing in math and science when I was 7 years old because that was the only way at that time I could get the best education, because there was a real focus on STEM education. So I became number one in my province out of 200 million people when I was 14, after I competed for seven years. And then I was selected in the National Team to represent China to compete internationally. 

So I'm a professional mathlete. I competed for a living. I think the reason why I was so drawn to science, number one, is because I think there was nothing more satisfying or powerful to use science to save people's lives. I think that's why I was actually very drawn to the profession of medicine.

And second is, when I was 11 years old, I participated in a public speaking contest. The topic was how youth can contribute to society. I never thought I was the smartest. I always think I over prepare. For me, it's just I sleep less. I do more problem sets. I read more so I can be at least on the, kind of like same starting point as my peers.

That competition I was kicked out because the judges said I was ugly. They didn't want to listen to what I had to say because of my acne and eczema. I never knew a public speaking contest was a beauty contest. And there are a lot of things in life that shouldn't be a beauty contest.

I think science was fair to me. Science didn't judge me by how I looked. It's really grueling and it's very hard because failure is constant, but at least I wasn't denied an opportunity just because of how I look. At that time, I didn't know how to fix that, overnight especially.

That's I guess why I'm just obsessed with science and just really put me on the track to think about how to solve those problems. I studied that point in medicine and later on to dermatology. But before that, I got full ride at MIT and was able to work with the best cancer research lab in the world with Dr. Bob Langer, who is the co-founder of Moderna, and dozens of public biotech companies.

I started working to cure prostate cancer when I was 18, and working with PhDs, postdocs. I was the youngest ever in Langer Lab as an 18-year-old to really learn the best technology out there and to be able to try to think about how to cure diseases and try to save people's lives.

Moderna was just started at that time when I was in Langer Lab. It is not the Moderna we know today. I think in my world of research, there's so many things happening that are not going to come to be known in the next 20, 30 years, but that's just the nature of, I guess, frontier research and how long it takes to bring something new from lab to, eventually, a drug to save people's lives.

09:49 Trina Renea: So how did it bring you to starting a sunscreen? Or you don't really call it a sunscreen. It's more of a— what did you call it, Michelle?

09:59 Michelle Yoswa: I was saying it's a therapeutic UV shield that has so many properties, because the background of zinc oxide is wound healing. It's used for burn victims. It's used for children with ____ [10:11], so it was the ideal ingredient for us to use.

But then Sophie changed it. Everyone else is using the same zinc oxide. We have our own DiamondCore proprietary zinc oxide that performs differently than anything on the market. And so we've kind of created our own lane. We're really not comparable to everything else because we have our own zinc oxide that no one else has.

Sophie, if you want to talk about the DiamondCore, it's really impressive. It helps with resilience. It helps with our delivery system so we can help patients with compromised skin. I'll let Sophie talk on that.

10:51 Sophie Bai: Thanks, Michelle. I think why I'm coming back to skincare is because of my childhood experience. Skincare to me is healthcare. And I want to build a company that can use, actually, the most advanced research which I have been using in oncology and immunology but it's rare for people to apply that in dermatology.

That's how I founded B.A.I. Biosciences. We have more than 20 patented molecules, ranging from UV filters to hair loss to atopic dermatitis are all very common dermatological concerns.

Back to Pavise, there definitely is a need for better, safer sun protection in combination with skin rejuvenation. Even though nobody likes the word ‘anti-aging’, but I guess looking for the Fountain of Youth is the human nature.  Everybody wanted to look young and healthy, and 90% of the damage is attributed to the sun.

So how do we solve the root cause of all the issues we're experiencing? Skin cancer is only a serious form of sun damage or photodamage. But on the more “cosmetic side”, you have melasma, you have fine lines and wrinkles, you have skin sagginess. All of those issues can be attributed to sun and ROS. 

That's when our scientists, including myself, decided to look into can we engineer one molecule that can target the root cause of probably most of the skin concerns we have? That needs to scavenge ROS. That needs to provide very, very high and stable UV protection, especially in the UVA range which are the aging rays. 

That's how we came up with DiamondCore. Actually, it's diamond-augmented zinc oxide that provides five times higher UV protection compared to other traditional mineral UV filters. But at the same time, scavenging ROS it's the first time being able to get done in terms of a UV filter.

13:22 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: Do you mind explaining to our listeners what scavenging ROS means?

13:29 Sophie Bai: Yes. So Reactive Oxygen Species, you can think of those as very active, harmful particles flying around trying to damage your skin, damage your cells. They are generated mainly by UV exposure or light exposure, in general, outside of the UV range. 

When light hits a chromophore— so, here, a chromophore can be our melanin, can be DNA or can be UV filters, AKA your sunscreen. ROS is generated. And ROS in turn can damage the skin and cause inflammatory responses, causes collagen degradation and also attribute to skin cancer formation. 

So, by blocking UV, it's doing part of the job, but by truly scavenge or get rid of the ROS before they can hit your skin to cause all the damage, truly is the step you need to take to prevent all of the downstream reactions that can cause permanent damages to our skin.

That's what we did with DiamondCore, that very unique core shell structure was able to utilize high efficiency electron shuttling. It's a tongue twister, but it's a mechanism of action to actually be able to really get rid of all of the reactive oxygen species before it can damage your skin. That's the key part of DiamondCore. 

15:18 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: How did you even come up with linking zinc oxide to diamond particles? That's such a unique concept. How did that come to you?

15:29 Sophie Bai: Yeah. I think, when I first decided what to look into, UV filter is always a very hot area. Zinc and titanium are the only two UV filters deemed safe by the US FDA, so that's where we have to start.

It starts with a metal oxide, either zinc or titanium. And then we look at the physical properties of those UV filters. Titanium is a strong UVB absorber but really weak in the UVA range, which is not ideal for skin aging. Zinc, traditionally, is a very weak UVB absorber. That's why usually you would see a combination of zinc and titanium together to create a mineral sunscreen.

Then the white cast is an unbearable issue for many of us. Not every day is a Halloween and we don't want to look like that every day. First, patient compliance. 

That's when I started to think about how can I start with zinc or titanium, which are the safest materials deemed by the US FDA and then change or optimize its physical properties for it to scatter light better. 

Then I looked into the ROS problem. That, I guess, is a hard moment for me was when I was actually looking into the research of refractive index. That basically determines how particles can scatter, like change the path of light.

Diamond actually has the highest refractive index. Then I started to think about, “Wow, can I actually use diamond to make sunscreen?” But then it started to be like extremely rare, it's also extremely expensive. You don’t want to use it like a sandpaper.

That's where the chemical engineering principles come in mind. It's like how do I create a particle to basically have that diamond properties? That's how I think about different ways to create structures or how do I, I guess, eventually came up or created, engineered the DiamondCore zinc oxide.

17:59 Julie Falls: Can I ask a maybe two or three-part question? So this is going to act as a better shield than the average sunscreen? Less damaging to your skin if you're wearing this as opposed to something else? 

And then the other thing I noticed looking at your website is that it actually can help with healing. It accelerates healing time and also with hyperpigmentation, so people who already have sun damage your product can help with that. So, how? 

These are all my questions. Maybe I can simplify it by saying how does it differ than the average sunscreen that we're using?

18:58 Sophie Bai: I guess our product is not just a sunscreen. In order to have total skin rejuvenation, you need to have sun protection function in it. That's non-negotiable. 

And the wound-healing part is because we are able to scavenge ROS at such a high efficiency, that really helps with dermal fibroblast migration, which have clinical studies and data on to show it works twice better in promoting wound healing compared to standard of care. 

That has been done in vivo, as well as we have done post-CO2 laser, post-ablative laser immediately using Pavise to see really accelerated recovery time. It helps with re-epithelialization, and that's essential for closing the wounds. 

The reason we can do it is by scavenging ROS, which nobody else can because we manufacture our own DiamondCore zinc. Nobody else has hands to our molecule. 

And in terms of hyperpigmentation, so that's two-part. Number one is hyperpigmentation is typically caused by repeated exposure by UVA rays. Here, UVA has nothing or very little to do with SPF. SPF is mainly a measure of UVB rays which are the burning rays, and that the long wavelength UVA are not being taken into consideration for SPF number. By only looking, the SPF 30, 40, 50 doesn't solve your pigmentary disorder issues. 

Pavise DiamondCore actually has highest UVA protection on market. Period. That's one reason to help with pigment formation and, two, is scavenge ROS is to prevent inflammatory responses. Inflammation could cause conditions like melasma to come back.

And third is our product actually has a very potent cocktail in it. We call it the photoaging cocktail that has niacinamide, tranexamic acid, licorice root, astaxanthin, Pycnogenol, and I forgot the sixth one.

21:23 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: Michelle can tell us.

21:24 Michelle Yoswa: It's silymarin. 

21:26 Sophie Bai: Yes, silymarin. It's actually my favorite ingredient. How can I forget about that?

21:30 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: It's okay. You're in Barbados.

21:31 Michelle Yoswa: Pycnogenol is my favorite.

21:36 Sophie Bai: So we actually have the cocktail that's actually developed through a drug development process called High-Throughput Screening. We started with a compound library of 10,000 compounds that has some sort of evidence to show it can reverse or repair photodamage. 

So we started with the 10,000. We eventually narrowed it down to the six. We have to then find the most optimal ratio for the six to work together. 

DiamondCore actually helps the delivery of those molecules deeper into the skin compared to without DiamondCore. That's why we have studies to show, skin permeation studies to show twice as much niacinamide is able to get delivered deeper into the skin compared to simple niacinamide product without DiamondCore in it. That's why you're able to see kind of like erasing some of the pigment, dark spots, melasma as well as rosacea, because our DiamondCore really helps with ROS scavenging and that, again, cuts off the inflammatory responses, which is the culprit of a lot of rosacea patients.

22:52 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: Sophie, can you talk about the SPF P++ on the labeling? I know that's a European label but we don't really have that in America. I know that's an advanced way to describe how protective the SPF is.

23:07 Sophie Bai: Yeah, definitely. In the US, we have two nomenclature. One is SPF, Sun Protection Factor, but that was developed I think in the ‘70s mainly as sunburn measure. So how long does it take for your skin to burn. The burning rays are the UVB rays and a little bit of the shorter wavelength UVA rays. 

Then later, I think in the ‘80s or ‘90s, people still get skin cancer after using sunscreen. That's when scientists started to look at are there other parts of the wavelength that we're not considering, that's still causing skin cancer? That's when UVA became kind of the topic.

That's when FDA started to mandate broad spectrum, meaning that it has to have some sort of UVA protection. However, it's not quantified. 

And by meeting the broad-spectrum standard, it's very easy. It's a very low bar and it's very well known in academia. So there's no way, really, for consumers to know how good your sunscreen actually has UVA protection, especially for those with melasma or rosacea.

Japan actually has a PA rating. PA stands for Protection of UVA. That's when you have ranging from one plus to four pluses indicate the level of UVA protection. That is also in vivo test, so it's also like you have to test in humans to get that rating.

Pavise has the highest, where it has four pluses. And if there's five plus then Pavise will be five plus, but there's no five pluses out there. So that's the PA rating that we have done.

That is not required in the USA but we want to do it just to show our scientific rigor and we're very confident about what we can do.

25:06 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: What you said about SPF really as a measurement only of the burning ray and that was something that we realized wasn't enough. We needed to protect from the UVA ray. 

And that when a product does say ‘broad spectrum’, it doesn't even really mean that it's really totally protecting from all the UVA rays. That's why I tell my patients they have to wear clothes and hats, because you really don't know each individual SPF sunscreen that you're using how good it is to protect from the UVAs.

So I just love your product because I do know that it is protecting completely from all the damaging rays. I think all that, the plus, plus, plus is very interesting. Maybe we'll see more products like that in America. Who knows? I know the FDA doesn't regulate that or require that, but I love that explanation.

25:51 Trina Renea: Does it also protect from the indoor lights that they say come from your computer and your… what are the lights?

26:02 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: Blue lights.

26:03 Trina Renea: The blue lights. The ones that also cause skin cancer indoors.

26:08 Sophie Bai: That's a great question. What we really have seen, especially academia, is visible light. It's wavelength longer than 400 nanometers. In combination with UVA rays are synergistic together to cause more hyperpigmentation. That has been proven in academics and in clinics.

That's where protecting against longer wavelength, extending to blue light and high-energy visible light is crucial for people who are prone to hyperpigmentation, darker skin types as well as people who have melasma.

I think there really is a misunderstanding or misconception from consumers about what sunscreen does. People think about it as a beach product. People think about, “Oh, I only need it in the summer.” 

But I think for us, we try to tell people that even ambient light causes harm. You don't have to be, for me, right now in Barbados to get damage. Typically me in Boston, I get a damage. That's why I think I really want to get the message out for people to understand. It's not just for the summer, for the beach, for the vacations. It is every day. 

And the longer wavelength of UVA do penetrate through the windows. They penetrate through the glass. UVB don't. UVB rays don't but UVA rays do. Same with high-energy visible light. They do penetrate through the glass too.

And in terms of blue light emitting from your devices, I guess studies had conflicted results.  But, for us, we always want to be on the safer side, especially the preventive measure is pretty convenient.

So our DiamondCore does scatter blue light. It does protect you, extending to the visible light range that have been proven in clinical studies to synergistically cause hyperpigmentation.

28:32 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: And I know you don't claim any waterproof or water resistance, which is very difficult to test— not difficult to test but it's a whole nother testing situation. But your sunscreen does last six to eight hours. Is that what you're claiming?

28:48 Sophie Bai: We designed our product, we never call it sunscreen because it's an undersell of what the product actually does. We don't want it to be water resistant. The reason is because it's more likely to cause breakouts if it's water resistant because of the composition of the product. 

And we want it to be an everyday comfortable-wear product people want to use. Daily compliance is the most important thing that's why we decided not to formulate into a water-resistant product. 

Also, our message is like it's not a sports product. It's not a beach product. Pavise is not. 

On the longer-lasting claim, we need to go back to why FDA required to reapply sunscreen every two hours. Back in the days, even before the mineral filters are commercially available, there are chemical UV filters. There's only one chemical UV filter that protects against the UVA range and that is Avobenzone. 

Avobenzone is very unstable. It degrades under light. There are multiple studies to show that Avobenzone in combination with other UVB filters, like homosalate or octisalate, all of those degrade more than 50% within 90 minutes.

That's why FDA requires the every-two-hour application because of the degradation of Avobenzone under light. 

For DiamondCore, it has very high photostability. Two reasons. Number one, it is a mineral filter and the method of action is absorption and scattering. That actually gives you extra stability to prevent photodegradation under UV exposure.

Number two, because it scavenges ROS, ROS accumulation causes erythema. Those two together actually gives very enhanced photostability of DiamondCore as a UV filter.

In terms of duration, for people who don't sweat like crazy or not working out, sweating nonstop, you wipe your face everything will be gone. You wipe your face, if you don't have the product on then you don't get the protection, or in the water. 

But if you are just like me, mainly walking around in lab, in office, then I don't need to reapply and there's no need for reapplication.

So the best way, definitely be on the cautious side and use our UV camera to check when you need to reapply. That would actually give you a very accurate time based on your own personal lifestyle, your own skin types. Because we've found that people with oily skin tend to have sunscreen, not just our product but every single sunscreen out there come out faster compared to people with dry skin. 

So it really depends by your own skin type, by your own environment and by your own lifestyle. So, check the UV camera to see when you need to do that.

32:19 Trina Renea: I have a question. How well does makeup go over the top of this product?

32:27 Julie Falls: And also, can you put all your other products under it and still get the benefits of everything that's in it?

32:35 Trina Renea: Right. Do you recommend putting it on last before your other products? And does it sit well on top of other serums and moisturizers? And then after that, does it work well with makeup, to put makeup over the top of it?

32:53 Sophie Bai: Yeah. I'll answer the last question first. It does not pill under makeup, because pilling is something we learned from consumers that one of their main concerns about sunscreens is that it pills under makeup. That's preventing them from using it.

Our product does not pill under any foundation, any makeup product. 

And on the first question, product layering, truly I don't use anything else. I just use Pavise because the photoaging cocktail is more potent than probably any serum out there. It's a one-and-done product in the morning.

33:36 Trina Renea: That's amazing.

33:38 Sophie Bai: I just use it, I'm very lazy. I don't want to have a 10-step skincare routine. I cannot adhere to it.

The reason we have a lot of emollients, a lot of hydrators, a lot of moisture lockers in the product formulation is because we want people to not have to use additional moisturizers, because you don't need it. This already does the job.

34:06 Trina Renea: I have to say I tried it. I just got one recently from Dr. Vicki and I tried it. I could automatically feel— I mean, first of all, it just goes in like a moisturizer, but I felt like it was like a shield on my skin. I felt like almost not like I was wearing— I don't know. It just felt very protected. I don't know how to describe the feeling of it but it's different than anything else.

And then I felt like it was still there at the end of the day. When I washed it off with your cleanser, I used your cleanser because I read on your cleanser it says ‘makeup remover as well as cleanser,’ so I was like, “Oh, I probably actually need to use this to get this ingredient off of my skin.”

I did find that it took it off my skin very well but, afterwards, I felt like I had deeply moisturized my skin all day. My skin felt so different than it normally does. That was kind of cool. I really like that feeling. I was like, “Oh, my God. My skin's so soft after this.” So that was cool.

35:19 Sophie Bai: Thank you. I'm so glad to hear that, because a lot of our customers are saying that their skin feels baby soft wearing Pavise, and especially with continued use after a month or two that your skin does feel softer.

35:34 Trina Renea: Do you recommend that they take it off with the cleanser? Is that an important part of removal? Did you create the cleanser for that reason?

35:46 Sophie Bai: We created the cleanser because when we tested out a lot of cleansers on the market, I believe we tested between 80 to 90 cleansers in the US market, majority of them don't remove sunscreen at all. It's not just our product. It's majority of the sunscreens out there.

36:00 Trina Renea: Interesting. 

36:01 Sophie Bai: And the reason we discovered that was to use the UV imaging to see, right? Because you can see with UV imaging. That's when we know we have a need to create something that does the job.

The reason why it's important, I think it's mostly important for two reasons. Number one, for acne-prone skin, like myself. Prior to us creating our products, I get breakouts from sunscreens constantly, left and right. I really hate using it. I know my experience is not alone, that's why removing is very important.

And number two is for people who have a pretty good night skincare regimen, especially when you're using retinol or when you're using some of other active skincare products. You don't want a layer to sit between your product and your skin, because then it prevents or really delays or decreases absorption of the product for it to work. That's why removal is very important.

For those two reasons, that's why we decided to create our cleanser. And as I said earlier, I'm lazy. I don't like double cleansing. That's why I wanted to make sure it gets all the makeup off and, at the same time, without feeling stripping, drying, because I'm a patient of eczema and I can't use any of those products. I still feel very hydrated after using the cleanser.

37:36 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: I cannot believe we haven't talked about the best part of Pavise, which to me— well, maybe the second best part, is the camera. You've been hinting, Sophie, about this UV camera. You can tell that the sunscreen is still on hours later. 

One of the big sales points to me is the camera that you guys sell along with it, because not only does it show how thick it looks under the UV filter but how thin it is in reality, but it looks like mud under the UV filter. But also hours later, you can see that it's still on. You can check your kids’ sunscreens. You can check your own sunscreen.

Can you tell us a little bit about the technology behind the camera and why somebody would want to get this camera?

38:17 Sophie Bai: Definitely. To you, guys, it's a very familiar concept, right? Like VISIA and all those imaging machines you guys have in your office.

38:28 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: Big, huge machines that we have compared to your little, tiny, fingernail-sized camera.

38:37 Sophie Bai: Yeah. So that was where the inspiration came from, like having those imaging machines are so helpful for patients, for everybody. Seeing is believing, right? Oftentimes, it doesn't matter how much you tell your patients, tell consumers, “You need to do this.” Unless they see it, they're like, “Okay.” So they're not really motivated or incentivized to do something or to create a habit.

That's when we decided can we do something that can make all of this very visual. That's when we decided to create this very tiny device that you can attach to your phone, battery-less, to be able to see not only sunscreen application. Not just Pavise but any sunscreen out there. 

How it works, really, is it has a UV sensor that could detect any subject after hitting by UV to see if they absorb or scatter or don't do anything else with the UV rays. That's the, I guess, hard tech part of the device. 

And then we have an app to basically visualize that, because what it actually does is because you change the light path right after hitting an object, the sensor detects that, detects how the light path has been changed. Then we can create image based on the changed path of the light.

I think a lot of the cool things we actually learned from our consumers is that you can actually see early changes of your skin that are currently not visible to your naked eyes. Hyperpigmentation, hypopigmentation you can actually see from the UV camera, again, because the UV light path has changed, if there's any slight subtle changes of your skin. 

That also has been very helpful for people to make them actually book derm appointments to check what's going on with their skin and be more vigilant about skin protection. 

And moms love our device just because the kids love it and the kids can see it and they think it's really fun. And then, all of a sudden, applying sun protection becomes such a fun thing and becoming like a bonding moment of mom and their kids.

Also, skin cancer patients as well as immunocompromised patients that need very, very serious sun protection. That's where our device can tell you, do you have missed spots, missed areas? Most people do miss areas of their nose tip and undereye area or like high cheek. Tip of the nose, that's the most common place to get skin cancer and also back of the ear. 

So this device will actually help you from your own application habit, that are there missed spots there that you need to check?

We got a lot of requests, actually, from moms. We have a customer. She is in Australia and she has a very immunocompromised son that can't go outside and desperately needed our camera to help to inform if the kid is protected. We just gave it to Australia for her for free.

Again, back to the point that we want to make skincare healthcare and to what extent we can help people. We're out there to do it. 

We also donated our UV cameras to a UK hospital that they are doing a study to see the sun damage on organ transplant patients.

42:24 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: That's amazing. I had a patient who I showed the camera to in the office who said, “Oh, yeah, you can just get these online.” It was the first time I had seen the camera, the Pavise camera, but is that true? Like these cameras are available online? I guess they also probably come with apps. I don't know. Are you familiar with that?

42:41 Sophie Bai: Yes. I think what is special about our technology is that a lot of the non-Pavise UV cameras use a cheaper sensor and it's actually not being diffused the way we do. We actually have another sensor on top of the UV light sensor to weaken the UV light, that's why it's safe for our naked eyes. Because, for your VISIA machine, your patients have to close their eyes when the photos need to be taken. Because UV rays are harmful to your eyes.

The others out there, they don't have this UV-weakening sensor our product has to make it eye safe.

43:22 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: I see.

43:23 Sophie Bai: So that's one thing. And the second thing is we also have an adjusting chip in it, so make it very usable even outdoors. Even when the light or sunlight is so strong, you still are able to see under our UV camera, whereas some other alternatives out there, it's like you can't see the image at all when the sun is too strong.

43:52 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: That's absolutely right, yeah. And I would say it definitely gives the user a unique experience which everybody wants with a product. I think that the young kids these days, obviously, love their screens, and the camera in addition to the sunscreen I think makes the kids really want to put the sunscreen on. Even makes the husbands really want to put the sunscreen on.

In my own experience, my husband went on a ski trip with all of his male friends from college. And he is like, “I need the Pavise and I need the camera.” And he's never ever asked me to get him a sunscreen when he goes on these manly trips, so I was really excited to provide that for him.

44:30 Sophie Bai: That's great to hear. We do have a lot of male patients. I think just our packaging is very gender neutral. I think there's no— like, men don't feel that they're losing their masculinity when they use Pavise. 

And also because our storytelling really is very logical, which tend to resonate with men. Here's a problem. Here's how we solve it and here's the science backing it up. There's not a lot of fluff, romanticized marketing out there that typically tend to turn men away.

45:05 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: And the third side of the product are the lip sunscreen-slash-glosses, and they're beautiful. I know you only have three colors right now. 604 flies off our shelves in the office. My esthetician puts it on everybody at the end of every facial. Everybody walks out with…

45:20 Julie Falls: What color is that one?

45:21 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: It's the lightest one. It's such a beautiful like a light tan. 

So, tell me again why you decided to make the lip product? Are you going to come out with maybe a tinted version of the sunscreen ever?

45:36 Sophie Bai: Yeah. So the lip is because I have a condition called venous lake. Dr. Rapaport, you’re definitely most familiar with this. I got it when I was 25, 26. I got it very young. That just shows all the regrettable sun damage that has occurred in my teenage years, in my college days. 

45:57 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: But I thought you were studying and reading the whole time. You were actually out in the sun when you were a teenager?

46:03 Sophie Bai: Not in China but when I came here. Tanning is such a popular thing to do. It's like if you don't go tan, there's something wrong with you. Yeah, we were also studying just under the sun, but still studying.

46:19 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: I gotcha.

46:23 Sophie Bai: But, yeah, so I got really dark, like very, very, very dark, like ten shades darker than I am right now. But most of my peers do tanning. I think it's still very big of a culture right now. Still, people are out there using tanning beds, which is terrible for you. 

So I got venous lake, thus I know the importance of lip protection. It's accumulative exposure from UV rays, especially in the UVA range, that's why we decided to create a lip product.

We are the first in the industry to create color without color. The three different colors are actually only generated by iron oxides. No synthetic colorants or dyes or lakes, which are very common in every single color-cosmetic product, in every single lipstick. The reason is because perioral dermatitis has been more common, and then oftentimes, those people can't really use colored cosmetics, especially lipsticks.

How do we create a product that people can wear safely without worries every day? That's why we decided to eliminate all of the colorants that National Eczema Association don't recommend using for eczema patients. And then we started to engineer how can we create color just using iron oxides, which in our products the benefit of that is to provide even longer or like a more visible light scattering protection. That's a very innovative, unique part of the lip product. 

And the three colors, so 604, 616, 774, are actually the nanometers of the light and that's most close to the color. 

48:10 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: I love that.

48:11 Trina Renea: That’s cool. Really scientific.

48:14 Sophie Bai: We're very nerdy about naming, so like 604 nanometer, that's actually the color of the light which is 604 nanometer.

48:22 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: Amazing. 604 is really beautiful. Thank you for explaining that.

48:27 Michelle Yoswa: Also, Dr. Rapaport, for your patients that need to protect their investments with their lip filler, this is the best protection for it because they can put it on immediately after the treatment, but then also it's protecting against the UVAs which are making our lips age. 

And then for someone like myself with eczema, I have lip eczema as well, so using any colors can trigger my lips. So this has been really nice for me.

48:54 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: You're right. I never really thought about that. Super, super big problem with eczema patients. I really do feel bad for them. They shy away from any kind of color. It's Aquaphor, Vaseline or bust. 

49:10 Julie Falls: What happens? Do you get like an allergic reaction?

49:12 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: Irritation.

49:13 Trina Renea: So now that I know that you can work with pigment in the lips, can you also put some pigment in a sunscreen as well?

49:22 Sophie Bai: Yeah. We've got a lot of feedback from that. I think it still goes back to why there are tinted sunscreens out there. The reason is because people want to mask the white cast and that's why you have a tinted product.

49:42 Trina Renea: Interesting.

49:44 Julie Falls: Is it also to cover up maybe some imperfections on your skin, redness or discoloration?

49:49 Sophie Bai: Yeah.

49:51 Julie Falls: That's why I use it sometimes.

49:56 Sophie Bai: We believe the first thing is to care for your skin. Makeup is second. And we want to get your skin so good that you don't need to wear a foundation, you don't need to cover it up anymore. 

50:10 Julie Falls: Oh, that’s the goal.

50:14 Sophie Bai: For us, not having a tint was a design choice. Adding tint is very simple. First of all, creating something that's transparent is not.

50:25 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: Exactly.

50:26 Sophie Bai: Adding color is very, very simple. We decided not to do it for a couple of reasons. Number one is we don't want to exclude men from using it, and they will not if it's a tinted product. It doesn't matter what you say.

Second is our biggest need actually right now in clinics is post-procedure care. You have to put it immediately after ablative, non-ablative lasers, microneedling, RF microneedling. You can't use tint after that.

51:04 Trina Renea: No, but also a lot of doctors send the patient home and they say, “Don't put anything on your face. Just let it heal. Nothing on your face.” So you're saying that you could put Pavise on their face before they leave the office.

51:20 Sophie Bai: Yes. Exactly.

51:21 Trina Renea: Like a healing balm but also a protector and a healer.

51:27 Michelle Yoswa: It's a wound healer, yeah.

51:28 Sophie Bai: Yeah, it's the first time demonstrated that you can immediately put it on post-ablative laser, that as a sunscreen. No adverse events, no issues. That's why, I guess, for a lot of the “post procedure care” in the past, that people would recommend you not put sunscreen on for like a week. 

But that kind of defeats the purpose of what you're doing, which is to reverse photodamage. And then your skin is traumatized. You go out there, you get even more photodamage. So it's kind of like a dilemma.

With Pavise, you solve this problem, to actually be able to put it on traumatized skin immediately. And then really helps with wound healing and reduce down time.

52:18 Julie Falls: Dr. Vicki, have you tried it after any lasers or procedures?

52:21 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: Yes, we put it on the patients after microneedling, microchanneling, Morpheus. No issues, no problems.

52:31 Trina Renea: Do you have a backbar size for the doctors to use in-house? 

52:38 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: I don't have a backbar size. Do you carry a backbar size, Sophie?

52:42 Michelle Yoswa: Not at the moment. Are we going to, Sophie? What do you think?

52:48 Sophie Bai: Well, like I get my product feedback from Michelle at all, so if Michelle tells me to create backbar, we will create backbar.

52:56 Michelle Yoswa: And then Dr. Rapaport, we just came out with a post-procedure care as well, instructions for your patients. I'll make sure you have those as well.

53:04 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: That'd be great. And Michelle, you are so awesome on a day-to-day for us. Is there anything that you want to add that we didn't touch on today? Anything really important that we forgot about?

53:16 Michelle Yoswa: Nothing. Not so much. Just letting the listeners know that if they have compromised skin, like how this relates to them. So somebody with rosacea, eczema and active acne, Pavise is your answer for the patient that is not going to do multiple steps. Because there are some people that do want a lot of steps and then there's a lot of people, like myself, that don't. Pavise is going to be your answer. 

For male patients, Pavise is your answer. 

And then your post-care, I've done a lot of meetings lately and I'm finding that there is a strong need for a UV shield immediately after treatment. And so I feel like we have kind of answered that need. Everybody can now have Pavise to protect their patients right after any treatment.

So we're filling a need. We've got, like Sophie said, so many things coming out in the future. I'm really, really excited for everyone.

And once people use Pavise, they love it. The interactive camera is a gamechanger. 

For me, I'm just really excited to be here. I love the product so much. And being a woman of color, to be able to use this product and know that it's not going to make me look like I have a white cast or look strange is a big difference, because a lot of people don't cater to Fitzpatrick 3 and up. And so we are really doing that, which I love.

54:33 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: And, honestly, the name, I didn't even delve into that at all. But I love the description of why you named it, about it being the shield. It really felt like a shield when Trina used it. It's a UV shield. I love that so much.

I know that the cost is an issue for some of my patients. It's definitely higher than the average sunscreen, but I understand now why. It is literally not just a sunscreen. It's so much more than a sunscreen. It's a treatment product. It's a healing product. It's a moisturizer. It has antioxidants. It really is the one-and-done product for everybody in the household.

And you sell it on your website, pavise.com for $148. We sell it in the office much cheaper, well, relatively. We sell it for $130. 

I know for the listeners today, if they are interested in it, we're going to put it in the show notes. They're going to get an extra 10% off of the $130. They will never get it cheaper anywhere else, unless they are getting a counterfeit product, which we don't recommend, obviously, just searching online for the super cheap product because it's probably fake. 

But it's going to be FC, as in Facially Conscious, Pavise is the code. FC Pavise will be the code for their 10% off on our website. And all those proceeds will go towards Facially Conscious’s future podcasts.

55:49 Trina Renea: Yay.

55:48 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: Yeah, very exciting.

55:50 Michelle Yoswa: Awesome.

55:53 Trina Renea: Well, I'm so excited about this new technology. We never talk about product specific on this show, unless it's like brand new technology or something different that people have created that's important for people to know. So this is a very, very, very good product that we think everybody should be using and protecting their skin. We're excited to share it with everybody.

Thank you, ladies, for coming on.

56:20 Julie Falls: Thank you so much.

56:20 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: Thank you, Sophie and Michelle. Thank you both.

56:22 Michelle Yoswa: Thank you for having us. It's so much fun. Thank you.

56:26 Sophie Bai: Thank you.

56:27 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: I'm sure I'll be seeing you, Sophie, at different meetings in the future.

56:31 Sophie Bai: Yes, definitely.

56:32 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: I'm going to come up and give you a big hug.

56:35 Sophie Bai: Oh, I'll find you first.

56:37 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: I love that. Okay.

56:39 Michelle Yoswa: Thank you, ladies.

56:39 Dr. Vicki Rapaport: Thank you both. Have a lovely time in Barbados.

56:44 Michelle Yoswa: Thank you, guys.

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