This article will address two recently published reports on acne treatment.

There was a time when I heard about some topical applications that claimed to shrink fat cells just beneath the skin.  If true, then they could help improve cellulite, the cottage-cheese-like appearance of the skin that many women have in the back of the upper thighs and buttocks and some men also.  I assumed these were a scam, but some of these drugs work, and here is the latest literature review on them.

This article addresses the latest literature review on drugs that have been documented to improve the health and appearance of aged or photodamaged skin.^{(1, pdf)}

Forbes.com posted an article, by Kiri Blakeley, on how to be a supermodel a few months ago.  It has some shortcomings that need to be addressed.

Some fashion world news of interest.

Since the 2008 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit issue has been heavily promoted recently, it is time to add to the previous discussion of what goes into the selection of Sports Illustrated swimsuit models.  This time some video clips are used.  Videos sometimes speak better than a handful of pictures or mere words.

One point that has repeatedly come up in this site’s criticism is that beauty standards fluctuate greatly, an alleged example being that overweight women were preferred in medieval Europe.  Just about everyone points out Peter Paul Rubens’ paintings featuring obese women.  What did medieval Europeans prefer in women’s looks?

Terry Pettijohn and Abraham Tesser have published a series of papers on variation in the physical features – mostly facial features – of American movie actresses and actors, Miss Americas and Playboy Playmates of the Year as a function of social and economic conditions from the 1930s to the 1990s.

Erin Strahan, Steven Spencer and Mark Zanna carried out the following 4 studies:^{(1, pdf)}