A new study led by researchers at UC San Francisco and Northwestern University has found that young people who use tanning beds show genetic changes in their skin cells that make their skin appear decades older at the genetic level compared to non-users. The findings were published on December 12 in Science Advances.
“We found that tanning bed users in their 30s and 40s had even more mutations than people in the general population who were in their 70s and 80s,” said Bishal Tandukar, PhD, a UCSF postdoctoral scholar in Dermatology and co-first author of the study. “In other words, the skin of tanning bed users appeared decades older at the genetic level.”
Skin cancer is the most common cancer in the United States, according to the American Cancer Society. Melanoma, which makes up about 1% of skin cancers but causes most related deaths, results primarily from exposure to ultraviolet (UV) radiation. Each year, around 11,000 Americans die from melanoma.
The research team analyzed medical records from over 32,000 dermatology patients regarding tanning bed usage, sunburn history, and family history of melanoma. They also sequenced cells from skin samples taken from 26 donors. Results showed that young indoor tanners had more mutations in their skin than people twice their age—especially on parts of the body like the lower back that typically receive little natural sunlight but are exposed during indoor tanning.
“The skin of tanning bed users was riddled with the seeds of cancer — cells with mutations known to lead to melanoma,” said senior author A. Hunter Shain, PhD, associate professor in UCSF’s Department of Dermatology.
Shain added: “We cannot reverse a mutation once it occurs, so it is essential to limit how many mutations accumulate in the first place. One of the simplest ways to do that is to avoid exposure to artificial UV radiation.”
Tanning beds remain legal and popular in the U.S., despite being classified as a group 1 carcinogen by the World Health Organization—the same category as tobacco smoke and asbestos—and bans or restrictions implemented by several countries.
Authors from UCSF included Delahny Deivendran; Limin Chen, PhD; Jessica Tang, PhD; Tuyet Tan; Harsh Sharma, PhD; Aravind K. Bandari, PhD; Noel Cruz-Pacheco, MS; Darwin Chang; Annika L. Marty, MS; Adam Olshen, PhD; Natalia Faraj Murad, PhD; and Iwei Yeh, MD, PhD. Co-first author Pedram Gerami, MD is affiliated with Northwestern University.
The study received funding from sources including the National Cancer Institute (R01 CA265786), National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases (AR080626), Department of Defense Melanoma Research Program (ME210014), and Melanoma Research Alliance.
No disclosures were reported.
