Talk:Melanin

message: The article does a nice job of pointing out that melanin is ubiquitous in the animal kingdom (except in spiders), but is much too silent on the question of whether melanin is found in plants.  This might be a good starting point for someone who wants to do non-original research on this topic:  http://www.madsci.org/posts/archives/2009-05/1241451642.Bt.r.html  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.221.125.125 (talk) 16:11, 22 December 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Melanin in Plants

message: Decreased UV exposure would result in lower melanin production, but what would happen to the existing melanin? Would it be dissolved? If a tanned person stayed out of the sun for months or years, would he become pale? 
:Hi I have white spots on my skin and I was wondering if eating carrots would help me get rid of these.  I have gotten them befor and stayed out of the sun as much as possible and they went away and now I have gotten some more but this time they won't go away no matter how much I stay out of the sun.
If you have any ideas to help please let me know. My email address is oreo@iland.net  thanks Laura''
::I recommend you see a doctor.-Anonymous
::Wikipedia is not a medical facility, but a dictionary! -FredrikM
:Wikipedia is not a place to seek medical advise, but nor is it a dictionary. Wikipedia is, believe it or not, an encyclopedia. -- Hadal 16:03, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Exposure

message: There is something which would appear to be missing from this page. Melanin protects against skin disease  - white soldiers in vietnam were more prone to skin infections than black soldiers. People in africa who live in jungles (in the shade!) are generally darker than those who live nearer the equator. Eskimo's are exposed to higher concentrations of UV than people on the equator (due to the reflection from the snow), yet are not as dark. These point towards skin colour being determined at least as much by prevelance of skin infection as it is by exposure to UV. Pog 22:29, 7 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Protection from disease

message: It is estimated that this color evolution in an immigrated populace takes approximately 10,000 years to complete.
If this is true, then wouldn't Native Americans that lived in northern Alaska/Canada and Tierra del Fuego have evolved lighter skin by now?  To my knowledge, the Americas have been populated for about 10,000 years and for the most part, have the same skin hues.  Something must be incorrect... --Bletch 22:39, 17 Oct 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Maybe it was selective breeding? :P lysdexia 00:27, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Observation

message: See my recent additions to Black supremacy for some provocative info re the melanin as a superconductor, Melanin Theory, and also for brief references to melanin in biotech.  I think all this should be included this article.  I'm thinking of doing a separate article on the Melanin Theory in conjunction with (or, possibly, separate from) the Cress Theory on Color and Confrontation.  People think Minstrel show is potentially explosive.  It oughta be interesting to see the reactions to this on Wiki. deeceevoice 12:01, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Melanin Theory and melanin in biotech research

message: I fixed up the beginning a little to add some information about what melanin actually is. I also deleted a lot of irrelevant verbal diarrhea from the end. This article is garbage. It needs a lot of work. Babajobu 18:38, 12 Feb 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I've restored the section on melanin and race bias.  There are people who think it's a fit topic -- and an important one -- for this particular article.  You seem to think so, too.  Otherwise, I don't think you would have stuck the sentence about bias on the end of the introductory information.  If you have constructive comments, please offer them -- but "verbal diarrhea" is not helpful.  Nor is deleting a section wholesale with nothing constructive to offer in its stead.  deeceevoice 19:10, 12 Feb 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: The section on social and rase bias is psychotic. It's about as relevant to an article on melanin as a lengthy discussion of the biochemical properties of melanin would be to an article on the KKK. I saved the first sentence because I think some mention is warranted of the the fact that variable skin melanin distribution has an impact social organization. But a wacked-out, meandering diatribe that includes expostulations on the comparative prevalence of various race-based ideologies, the structural context within which such ideologies are expressed, comparisons of different country's hierarchical structures, et cetera et cetera et cetera ad nauseum??!! Holy Sh1t!! You gotta be kidding me!! But hey, keep it. I'll stay out of the ethnic pissing contests, and leave them to those who get off on such things. In fact, I think you should expand that section. Maybe add some pictures of lynchings. As for me, I'll throw down the beginning of a section on eumelanin. As for the link between Parkinson's and melanin concentration...I've not heard of any such thing...regardless, melanin concentration in the substantia nigra and in the skin are not correlated. Norwegian albinos have the same melanin concentration in the substantia nigra as do Ghanain non-albinos. Babajobu 02:03, 13 Feb 2005 (UTC)

text: Did a clean up of this "verbal diarrhea".  Wareware 05:41, 14 Feb 2005 (UTC)

text: This is an article on melanin and its properties. The prolonged discussion on race bias, racism, various kinds of supremacy belong in each of their articles, respectively. The article on race already has a dicussion on various kinds of apartheid, so it's extraneous to write even more of that here. No need to drag on this "verbal diarrhea." A mention about them and links to the related articles, which both have more in-depth discussion and relevancy, is enough. What's so hard to understand?  Wareware 10:49, 14 Feb 2005 (UTC)

text: Yeah, well I enjoy ranting but have gotten to do ever-so-little of it thus far on Wikepedia because of the whole infernal "Wikiquette" thing. I couldn't resist the opportunity to indulge a little. :) Here's the dilly (or part of it) on dopamine, melanin and Parkinson's. Dopamine and melanin have very similar structures, and dopamine metabolism produces a form of melanin called "neuromelanin," which is different from eumelanin, pheomelanin, et cetera, but still certainly a melanin. Neuromelanin gradually accumulates in the neurons of the substantia nigra throughout a person's life. Kids have very little, elderly people have lots. When people get Parkinson's they start losing their neuromelanin, and their SN goes pale. The fairly recently-published histology and pathology books I'm using just take it for granted that the loss of neuromelanin is basically a side-effect of dopamine depletion. But I may have been a little too confident in assuming that that's the final word. I just checked the National Library of Medicine website and a bunch of new research is turning up more immediate connections between neuromelanin and Parkinson's than had been suspected. Also, it looks like they're also getting promising results in studies on therapies that involve endocrine manipulation of neuromelanin. Still, all of this specifically involves neuromelanin in the dopaminergic neurons of the SN, and I haven't personally learned, heard or run across anything stating that there is any connection whatsoever between skin melanin and Parkinson's. But I guess the take home message for me is that there is more going on here than I realized, so I can't write off the possibility that there is also--though I can't imagine how--some emerging connection between neuromelanin/Parkinson's and a person's skin melanin levels. Anyway, as you say, this article is about melanin generally, not just skin melanin in humans, so regardless the Parkinson's link is legit. Babajobu 19:57, 14 Feb 2005 (UTC)

text: Yeah, interesting it certainly is. I think I'll pick a related abstract at the NLM website and link to it at the end of the article.  Later when I have time I should add something on neuromelanin to the "different types of melanin" section. Babajobu 21:11, 14 Feb 2005 (UTC)

text: I have to agree, the end here really has nothing to do with Melanin.  The "Similar examples can be found in Brazil's highly socially color-stratified society; and, in the U.S., segregation, institutional racism, and internal "color consciousness" on the part of members of some ethnicities." is irrelevant, there is a article on Human skin color, which links to the this page on the chemical melanin.  The chemical melanin never had a political/sociological view, it was unbiased, as it is an unconscious amino acid. Human skin color, however, has that nice word human in the title.  And humans are huge on their political/sociological views.  So I am erasing the "Bias in human societies" section. I should mention again that there are two links to Human Skin color (the proper article for this information), it's the first link under the Human section and in See also.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.62.194.227 (talk) 07:05, 13 July 2012 (UTC)
thread_title: Cleanin' It Up

message: This list was included in the article, so I've preserved it here.  If anyone is interested in expanding the piece, here are some suggested areas of interest to contributors:
To be covered:
*eumelanin
*phaeomelanin
*Melanin Theory
*possible role of melanin deficiency in deafness and Parkinson's disease
*incidence of melanoma by "race"
deeceevoice 19:10, 12 Feb 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: List of To Do's

message: There's a note that this article should include material from Polyacetylene.  That article is a stub and I'm not sure how if belongs in this article.  Does anyone know what needs to be merged into this article? RJFJR 02:08, Mar 10, 2005 (UTC)
Melanin is biological polyacetylene, in much the same way latex of Brazil is polyisoprene.  They're two names for the same family of polymers, but one word is used by biologists and the other by materials scientists.  I put the merge there (somewhat naively) thinking that materials scientists like myself should know more about the vast quantity of work that's been done on polyacetylene by biochemists.  Really, the page should just become a redirect to this one...I'll try to take care of that sometime in the next week if I have the energy.  Anyone interested in electronics applications should read this article.--Polyparadigm 06:30, 10 Mar 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Polyparadigm, I inserted a link to organic semiconductors at the bottom of the page, which I inserted a while back.  I also wrote the paragraph referring to electronics applications, with a reference to "plastic electronics," a field for which there doesn't appear to be an article yet.  Perhaps it exists on Wiki under another name?  If not, perhaps you'd want to tackle the subject.  I certainly don't know enough of the field and what's happening research-wise to do so.  If there is an article on the subject, but under a slightly different name, perhaps you can insert an appropriate, working link in its stead?  Thanks.  deeceevoice 17:34, 11 Mar 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Polyacetylene

message: There seems to be a lack of chemists on Wikipedia...
Poly(acetylene), like all polymers, is named for its monomer. The correct notation includes the word poly followed by the name of the monomer surround by parentheses. The word polyacetylenes is a widely accepted term for a class of polymers that are derived from acetylenes. It is completely incorrect to refer to all structures containing alternating sp3/sp2 (single/double bonded) carbons as a polyacteylenes. Latex is most certaily not a polyacetyele. It is a polyisoprene, which is a completely different classifcation of molecules. Isoprene is a naturally occuring 5 carbon unit used in biological systems to construct molecules ranging from vitamin A to the compound that gives rise the smell of oranges and lemons (limonene, the enantiomers of which smell like orange and lemon). It is extremely difficult to teach someone who has not completed a college organic chemistry series how to classify polymers and exactly how incorrect it is to refer to a poly(isoprene) as a poly(acetylene) because to classify a polymer you have to do some retro-synthetic analysis.
In the definition of melanin it states that melanin is comprised of indolequinone, and dihydroxyindole carboxylic acid units. Neither of these are acetylenes therefore melanin is NOT a poly(acetylene).
Above comment was added by Fearofcarpet
So, is Melanin a organic semiconductor? pstudier 19:25, 2005 Mar 17 (UTC)
Actually, the comment in the above section does describe latex as natural polyisoprene.  But it also describes melanin as a polyacetylene.  Can someone check the stub at polyacetylene, please? RJFJR 20:21, Mar 17, 2005 (UTC)
-It does refer to poly(isoprene), but seemed to be lumping it into the same category so I wanted to make the distinction. I realize the way I worded it was poor, but I simply meant to draw a contrast between the two. Fearofcarpet 21:26, 17 Mar 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Chemistry

message: I'd like to refer those who have an interest in this subject to the talk page of the above-referenced article.  I've brought in some additional information regarding melanin-related deafness in mammals, as well more info regarding current melanin research in the fields of quantum chemistry and plastic (or organic) electronics that should appear in this piece.  And, yes.  Melanin is an organic semiconductor -- a fact which has been known since 1970. deeceevoice 08:20, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: See [[talk:black supremacy]] for info/links re physical properties ongoing high-tech research

message: This article has been protected for too long, and in any case there is no discussion here in the past week. Unprotected. --Tony Sidaway|Talk 15:24, 27 Mar 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Unprotected

message: The intro currently includes: ...where, among other functions, it serves as a pigment. Can we list some of these other functions? RJFJR 12:00, Apr 16, 2005 (UTC)
See the discussion in Black supremacy.  Forget the claims of Melanin Theory.  There's a lot of information presented there with regard to melanin as a mediator of radiation (posing a problem in the dermatological laser treatment of port-wine stains); its absence (in albinism and vitiligo) being linked to deafness in humans and other mammals, and with neurological disease states/neuromotor impairment, such as Parkinson's; as well as links to sites of biotech companies engaged in melanin research.  I don't have time to do any of this at the moment, but I've laid out much of the information there -- if anyone is interested enough to investigate.  Peace.  deeceevoice 15:48, 16 Apr 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: This is merely a statement of fact.  In societies across the world, there is a greater tendency to favor lighter skin -- even (and, perhaps, especially) in societies where European influence has been profound, in societies where such standards of beauty are actually antithetical to the peoples themselves.  In India in ancient times, for example, dark skin was preferred.  After Persian and British influence, the reverse is true.  The same with Latinos.  The same with the Chinese.  The same is true with blacks in many parts of Africa and the diaspora World.  Because of European colonialist and imperialist influences, European cultural values have been adopted by other societies, including European aesthetics when it comes to physical beauty.  It's why some Asians have eye surgery to remove the skin folds from their eyes.  It's why some Latinos and East Indians die their hair blonde and counsel their children not to marry someone darker than they.  Same with Jews. It's why some black folks bleach their skin and slice their noses.  And the funny thing about all this is that white folks are now rushing to buy bronzing gels (having now finally internalized the fact that sizzling in the sun was giving them melanomas), get butt implants, collagen injections for their lips and rat and tease their hair.  Silly (and sad) business -- all of it.  deeceevoice 18:01, 7 May 2005 (UTC)

text: Believe it or not, it's not 1800 and most Chinese HAVE seen "whites". Not only does China have a large Caucasoid (read: white) population, there are 1 billion TV viewers in China. As for white supremacism, it is not practised per se, but filtered down influences through the media. But in fact, Chinese have always favoured fairer skin - though darker skin were not discriminated against, merely, um, not as good. Of course this difference in skin colour in native Chinese population is very small, perhaps even smaller than the difference in Northern Europeans and Southern Europeans. Also, since Chinese people in general are as fair as Southern Europeans, the "white" supremacism is not manifest in skin colour, rather, it is in other Caucasoid features (big nose, round eyes, etc.) There are no Wacko Jacko in China. ;) -Hmib 07:50, 24 Jun 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Other functions

message: I'm thinking of removing the reference to skin melanin protecting neuromelanin: this is a single speculative reference on a psychiatry website. I can't find any supporting info in neurology texts or websites, which is the field in which such research would actually be done and such speculations investigated. Plus, the speculation clashes with everthing that is known about the etiology of Parkinson's. And there is a much stronger correlation between, say, prostate cancer and skin melanin concentration than between Parkinson's and skin melanin concentration. Babajobu 06:25, 18 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, I'll leave it, but I don't think it belongs. I'm not questioning the author's legitimacy as a psychiatric researcher...but my point is that psychiatry is not the field in which that kind of hypothesis about melanin would be investigated. It's a neurological issue. It's as though we had one quote from neurological paper making a novel suggestion about a dermatological issue. That wouldn't justify our including that comment in the article on skin. Unless we can find at least some evidence that some neurologist somewhere takes this idea seriously, than I don't think it belongs in the article. Babajobu 00:21, 21 October 2005 (UTC)

text: Pigmentary abnormalities have been observed in psychiatric and neurological illness for decades.  In fact,  IIRC it was part of the original definition of schizophrenia.  For the older history, see "Free radicals and Human Disease" 206.180.133.30 16:29, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Parkinson's disease, prostate cancer, and more

message: I don't wish to wade into what is a well discussed topic unannounced, but i was thinking of adding some text addressing the issue of whether loss of melanism in humans was due to positive selection for light skin (driven by the vitamin D requirement at northern latitudes) or simply a result of genetic drift (lack of UV pressure on maintaining dark skin). There is some new scholarly literature that seems to shed light on the issue (in favour of the former). Any thoughts? Rockpocket 08:30, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Evidence for adaptive loss of human melanism

message: There is a blocked out quotation(s?) about the Scots' low pigmentation levels and African's higher melanin levels under "Melanin and human adaptation" that is cited, but not really in prose. It's just presented in the middle of the paragraph without saying, "according to a recent study by ..." or something to that effect. Yom 08:21, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: To be honest, that is a remnant of an early version of the article that didn't explain the concepts on pigmentary evolution in greater detail. It doesn't really say anything that is not explaine further down and could probably be deleted now. Rockpocket 17:51, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Quotation

message: Your persistant desire to cite yourself is worrying, as it constitutes self-promotion.  Self-promotion is heavily frowned upon because it is a tactic used by all sorts of overly self-important net kooks.
So here is the rule:  If you want to make a change that in any way might be interpreted as self-promotion, you need to discuss it on the talk page of the article first.  If your edit is valid, someone else will do it for you.  — Dunc|☺ 15:09, 19 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: "Expert editors:  "No original research" does not prohibit experts on a specific topic from adding their knowledge to Wikipedia. On the contrary, Wikipedia welcomes the contributions of experts, as long as their knowledge is verifiable. We assume, however, that someone is an expert not only because of their personal and direct knowledge of a topic, but also because of their knowledge of published sources on a topic. This policy prohibits expert editors from drawing on their personal and direct knowledge if such knowledge is  unverifiable. 'If an expert editor has published the results of his or her research elsewhere, in a reputable publication, the editor can  cite that source while writing in the  third person and complying with our  NPOV policy.' They must cite reliable, third-party publications and may not use their unpublished knowledge, which would be impossible to verify. We hope expert editors will draw on their knowledge of published sources to enrich our articles, bearing in mind that specialists do not occupy a privileged position within Wikipedia."  Pproctor 15:38, 19 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  'If an expert editor has published the results of his or her research elsewhere, in a reputable publication, the editor can  cite that source while writing in the  third person and complying with our  NPOV policy.'
*As for wikilawering--as usual,  you have the rules wrong.  So you can't really complain when I cite the real rules back at you. Pproctor 16:37, 19 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Self-promotion

message: Actually, there is evidence for a link between pigmentation and development. The best and first example is Darwin's deaf white kitty, where Darwin even points out the developmental abnormalities. Similarly, oculocutaneous albinism and Waardenberg's syndrome are both associated with developmental abnormalities in (e.g.) the inner ear and the eye and their neural connections.  Melanin is a stable free radical.  So,  this might be a manifestation of Redox signaling, where redox processes control cellular functions. Another possibility is that this might be related to melanin's properties as a rigid-backbone class conductive polymer, rather like the ones in your new color cell phone. Pproctor 13:41, 3 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Melanin and Development-Part 2

message: "Melanin is a biopolymer and a neuropeptide."  How is melanin a peptide if it's composed of aromatic ring oligomers?  This must be a mistake.  Peiter 17:59, 24 May 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The problems go much deeper than that. All the stuff about polymers that cannot be supported by reliable references has to go. I'm going to start with some articles that talk about melanin polymers such as Impact of Melanin on Microbial Virulence and Clinical Resistance to Antimicrobial Compounds and try to craft a coherent summary. The section, "Physical properties and technological applications", needs to be looked at very closely.....most of it has nothing to do with melanin. --JWSchmidt 17:29, 1 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Neuropeptide?

message: Black skin may enhance the body’s natural immune system, and provide better protection against disease than white skin. Evidence shows that melanization of skin and other tissues form an important component of the innate immune defense system (Mackintosh, 2001; Nosanchuk and Casadevall, 2006). See full article here.  --70.68.179.142 (talk) 07:22, 29 May 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: AfricaResource is hardly a scholarly research publication. "Evidence" would be you posting links to a few peer-reviewed academic journal articles of original research.Pstanton 23:50, 15 November 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: This subhead drew my attention, because, to me, it seemed plausible from the git-go.  Melanin is part of the body's immune response. It is part of the reason when people are injured, darker scarring, or hyperpigmentation, occurs.  Melanin rushes to the site of a wound as part of the body's defense/healing response. Discounting Africa Resource out of hand because it is a black publication and not a scholarly journal doesn't hold up. One might use a similar argument to completely discount/dismiss every single word in this online encyclopedia. If you'd bothered to hunt the (active) link to check out the article, you would see that it is studded with appropriate citations from scholarly research.  deeceevoice (talk) 06:59, 12 July 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Black skin may enhance the body’s natural immune system

message: I've noticed there's this 'Dr Sebi' fellow who is saying Melanin doesn't exist or that there's no proof of it existing, stuff like that. Does anyone know if other people are denying it? Would this be relevant to mention on the article to people know the background of these conflicts, how they began, whether they're ongoing, that sort of thing? An example is this where he really seems determined it doesn't exist... and that melanin's role is served by carbon or something? Why would he conclude this? Tyciol (talk) 09:05, 9 August 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I'd doubt he's actually a doctor, as no one who denies the existence of something so easily confirmed and generally accepted as melanin is ever going to complete an undergraduate pre-med track, much less Medical school and a residency and board examinations. I'd say he can be dismissed as a quack.Pstanton 23:52, 15 November 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Melanin deniers?

message: Does anyone know of a good picture of the molecular structure of Melanin? It'd be good to have a photo+infobox in this article, most molecular biology articles have a similar setup. I looked for a photo of the melanin structure, but couldn't find one. --Pstanton (talk) 23:48, 9 February 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Molecular structure 

message: "This melanogenesis-based tan takes more time to develop, but it is long lasting."
What does "takes more time" refer to? More than what other process?  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.60.228.187 (talk) 13:47, 13 May 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Unclear passages 

message: I apologise in advance for any following Naivety; but this idea is the result of me doing my GCSE case study.
For my project I have been researching sunbathing. I found out about Melanin, and bearing in mind it's photoprotectant properties (and conventional sunscreens inability to provide protection against UVA radiation[a cause of melanomas, a particularly fatal variant of skin cancer]). I am wondering why manufacerers don't add it to sunscreens. 
Is my theory OK but financially non-viable; or does Melanin de-nature or in any other way become dangerous in sunscreens?
Sorry for above above stupidity. :-) 
Stanton13 (talk) 17:34, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: No naivete. It's already being done. ;)  deeceevoice (talk) 06:36, 12 July 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Melanin in sunscreens? 

message: For more on the properties of melanin, someone might want to visit the section of Melanin theory treating conspiracy theories.  I've added information there that should also be included in this article.  It has to do with melanin and addiction.  Some of you more familiar with the field than I might also want to check what I've written for accuracy/clarity.  deeceevoice (talk) 07:04, 12 July 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: More on melanin at [[Melanin theory]]

message: This article seems to contain weasel wording on the section for parkinson's. It cites a 1972 article claiming that the higher levels of melanin in blacks gives them a protective factor against parkinson's. This thinking is also used on the "melanin theory" article. More recent research finds things like hispanics to have higher frequencies if parkinson's, rather incosistent considering how they're darker: http://aje.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/short/157/11/1015  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.62.1.91 (talk) 16:09, 6 July 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Parkinson's 

message: Article says
"With humans, exposure to sunlight stimulates the skin to produce vitamin D. Because high levels of cutaneous melanin act as a natural sun screen, dark skin can be a risk factor for vitamin D deficiency in regions of the Earth known as cool temperate zones; i.e. above 36 degrees latitude in the Northern hemisphere and below 36 degrees in the Southern hemisphere"  However Pro vitamin d is produced by UVB (280- 315nm) according toSunlight, vitamin D and skin cancer By Jörg Reichrath and very often there is sunlight which does not have sufficient UVB to synthesize provitamin D. Another thing, it's not certain that melanin does filter out the wavelengths which produce vitamin D synthesis The value of melanin as a sunscreen says "The detailed structure of the absorption spectra of epidermal melanin pigmentation in vivo together with the reactivity of melanin precursors and metabolites to ultraviolet A (320-400 nm) and visible (400-700 nm) radiation indicate that epidermal melanin may not be considered simply as passive absorber in the skin that acts as a neutral density filter – i.e. absorbing equally strongly at all wavelengths. {...}by studying the action spectra for the erythema and pigment reactions of skin to ultraviolet radiation for individuals of different levels of pigmentation. Here we find that epidermal melanin is not a neutral density filter providing no or minimal protection for the induction of erythema at 295 and 315 nm and some protection at 305 and 365 nm.". Now the Wikpedia  article says "Because high levels of cutaneous melanin act as a natural sun screen, dark skin can be a risk factor for vitamin D deficiency in regions of the Earth known as cool temperate zones"  That should be "dark skin may be a risk factor " because the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies' recent report  says "some subgroups—particularly those who are older and living in institutions or who have dark skin pigmentation—may be at increased risk for getting too little vitamin D".  May suggests there is a possibilty whereas can is stronger and implies it is a fact.  There is evidence that melanin is not the cause of low vitamin D levels. Blood vitamin d levels in relation to genetic estimation of African ancestry  "African-Americans generally have lower circulating levels of 25 hydroxyvitamin D [25(OH)D] than Whites, attributed to skin pigmentation and dietary habits. Little is known about the genetic determinants of 25(OH)D levels nor whether the degree of African ancestry associates with circulating 25(OH)D. {...} We found novel evidence that the level of African ancestry may play a role in clinical vitamin D status". There is a degree of scientific uncertainty about melanin and vitamin D.  Overagainst (talk) 15:24, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Human adaptation

message: Article says "health authorities in Canada and the USA have issued recommendations for people with darker complexions (including people of southern European descent) to consume between 1000-2000 IU (International Units) of vitamin D, daily, through Autumn to Spring" Reference please! Overagainst (talk) 17:14, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Medical advice

message: Trying to figure out what was being compared in the second sentence below—and why POV seemed to hint at the desirability of a longer-lasting tan, even one occasioned by DNA damage—led me to its footnote, which is a link called "tanning tips" leading to the page of a tanning salon.
:"Production of melanin is stimulated by DNA damage induced by UVB-radiation,[1] and it leads to a delayed development of a tan. This melanogenesis-based tan takes more time to develop [than what?], but it is long lasting.[2]"
Now I wonder whether, in addition to the insertion of a peculiar sentence with advertising as a reference, the first of the sentences has been compromised, in the interest of a false continuity. Best to all, Michael (talk) 08:14, 25 April 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Tanning salon given as reference? Additional damage to text? 

message: Melanin pigmentation of hair, skin, and eye is thought to result from two separate but biogenetically interrelated classes of pigments: eumelanins (black-brown, insoluble in dilute alkali) and pheomelanins (yellow to reddish-brown, alkali soluble). Eumelanins are  generally considered to be derived from the enzymic oxidation of tyrosine through 3,4-dihydroxyphenylalanine (dopa), whereas pheomelanins arise by a diversion of the eumelanin pathway through the intervention of cysteine or related sulfhydryl compounds. A major intermediate in the biosynthesis of pheomelanins is the dopa metabolite 5-S-cysteinyldopa. (Novel free radicals in synthetic and natural pheomelanins: Distinction between dopa melanins and cysteinyldopa melanins by ESR spectroscopy Sealy RC et al (1982) http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC346312/pdf/pnas00448-0150.pdf)124.187.25.55 (talk) 09:57, 21 August 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Agree, 1982 is an old paper. There is a lot to improve in the article, including scope. Race issues and albinism probably don't need to be badly restated in this biochemical article (only some non-syndromic oca types of albinism are caused by melanin production per se, as some others are related to lysosome related organelles in general - also many people with albinism not so much care about the melanin which other people tend to be focused on, but their fovea and bcva being below 30/100). Nowadays it is believed tyrosine is converted to dopaquinone directly. 10.1074/jbc.272.42.26226 "We conclude that tyrosinase does not possess two separable activities,i.e. tyrosine hydroxylase and DOPA oxidase; the enzyme catalyzes the production of ortho-quinones from both monohydric and dihydric phenols." See also 10.1111/j.1751-1097.2007.00238.x --84.250.122.35 (talk) 21:11, 20 November 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Introduction needs complete rewrite 

message: Started bio on Peter Proctor,  in important melanin researcher. Welcome input. Nucleophilic (talk) 17:42, 24 January 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Started bio on Peter H Proctor, important melanin researcher 

message: Article needs to include a section about the role of melanin with the addiction of cocaine, nicotine, etc. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/05/090508134951.htm  and http://www.pnas.org/content/106/16/6772 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.85.3.79 (talk) 14:43, 27 March 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Drug Addiction 

message: I changed a sentence in the human adaptation section to remove mention of ionizing radiation effects of UV rays here: 
:"The melanosomes in each recipient cell accumulate atop the cell nucleus, where they protect the nuclear DNA from mutations caused by the ionizing radiation of the sun's ultraviolet rays."
UV radiation is not true ionizing radiation but exhibits some of the same characteristics. I feel the mention of ionizing radiation only confuses the issue here. from the ultraviolet wikipedia page where it notes UV that is involved in malanin production is non-ionizing:
:"UV light is found in sunlight and is emitted by electric arcs and specialized lights such as black lights. It can cause chemical reactions, and causes many substances to glow or fluoresce. Most ultraviolet is classified as non-ionizing radiation. The higher energies of the ultraviolet spectrum from wavelengths about 10 nm to 120 nm ('extreme' ultraviolet) are ionizing, but this type of ultraviolet in sunlight is blocked by normal dioxygen in air, and does not reach the ground. However, the entire spectrum of ultraviolet radiation has some of the biological features of ionizing radiation, in doing far more damage to many molecules in biological systems than is accounted for by simple heating effects (an example is sunburn). These properties derive from the ultraviolet photon's power to alter chemical bonds in molecules, even without having enough energy to ionize atoms."
Silve Slade (talk) 16:11, 31 May 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  UV Non-Ionizing Radiation 

message: "The most common biological melanin is eumelanin. This is a brown-black polymer of dihydroxyindole carboxylic acids and their reduced forms."
I am not a chemistry but shouldn't it be oxidised forms. Don't you oxidise a hydroxyl to get a ketone?
Mrmessy1 (talk) 22:43, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Chemistry of eumelanin 

message: This article should expound on racial differences noting which melanins are found in which races and which ones are not as well as the role of mixed races.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2602:306:C518:6C40:96E:4871:B481:E70E (talk) 12:26, 18 January 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Many Different Melanins 

message: I am an ID advocate, but I've noticed that WP articles do not editorially support ID. So I'm wondering for consistency sake if this statement in the article's intro should be changed: "Neuromelanin is found in the brain, though its function remains obscure." Back when it was hardly questioned that more than 90% of our genome had no function, it would have been inconsistent to say of a non-coding region that "its function remains obscure." But like with "junk DNA", design advocates can predict that neuromelanin has significant function. So it might actually hinder scientific discovery for a popular resource like WP to be silent and to not reference its expected function. So, do we remove the "function" statement, or leave it there? Bob Enyart, Denver KGOV radio host  (talk) 13:54, 4 July 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: This ten year old paper at PubMed, Neuromelanin in human dopamine neurons: comparison with peripheral melanins and relevance to Parkinson's disease, explores some proposed function. Bob Enyart, Denver KGOV radio host  (talk) 14:19, 4 July 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Change statement about neuromelanin that implies Intelligent Design? 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: Most bacteria can produce a mixed melanin which is very easy to purify.The melanin can be utilized for various applications Kurianoble2016 (talk) 04:34, 14 September 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Bacterial Melanins 

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thread_title:  External links modified (January 2018) 

message: Why isn't there a section on this, in the past there was a section I'm assuming someone deleted. But its in fact a semiconductor and needs to be added. Ankhael (talk) 15:25, 12 February 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Melanin semiconductor, why isn't there a section? 

message: I have read some interesting articles on melanin is now being looked at to having photosynthesis capabilities, and may change the way we assume that plants where the only living things to use light and convert into metabolic use. They are now looking at the possibility that humans and other animals may have these photosynthesis capabilities to using melanin. The articles are not peer reviewed. The same content has been published numerous times and not once has there been a published experiment. The papers are used to sell fraudulent medicines. 
References
1.The role of human photosynthesis in predictive, preventive and personalized medicine
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4125832/
2. Melanin directly converts light for vertebrate metabolic use: heuristic thoughts on birds, Icarus and dark human skin.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/18479839/ Ankhael (talk) 15:47, 12 February 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Melanin Photosynthesizing Capabilities In Humans And Animals 

message: There seems to be a contradiction between the article and the infobox concerning the structure of melanin. The article says at the beginning that melanin "is a broad term for a group of natural pigments". Further down various structures are shown:eumelanin, pheomelanin, neuromelanin, etc. which all have different families of structures.
However the infobox says that melanin has a specific structure with formula C18H10N2O4. This is supported by the references to Chem Spider and PubChem (the CAS link doesn't work), so I presume that the information has some validity. However the article does not make clear why the infobox structure has the same name as the whole family of compounds. Is this a structure from which all the others are derived?? Not very obvious as the infobox structure has five fused rings which is not true for the other structures in the article. Is this the majority component of biological melanin?? If so it would be good to add a representative composition with a source. And if these two guesses are wrong, could someone please clarify the relation between the infobox melanin and the whole family of compounds? Dirac66 (talk) 21:08, 4 May 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Molecular structure: infobox vs. article? 

message: The infobox shows a putative structure of melanin that is always, or very nearly always, incorrect.
Others (see above) have noted that this leads to some confusion.
The issue is summarised here: 
"Eumelanin from different sources is heterogeneous in 
size and in its fine chemical structure. Following
the empirical formula (C8H3O2N) suggested by Mason
[29], there are still some data on websites giving a defined
stoichiometric structure [30] where melanin, ID: 4884931, is
defined with the molecular formula C18H10O4N2, an average
mass of 318.3 for the minimal unit, and the systematic
name 3,8-dimethyl-2,7-dihydrobenzo[1,7]isoindolo[6,5,4-
cd]indole-4,5,9,10-tetrone, [30] Figure 2(a). As Mason’s
original proposal, these data should be considered as an
empirical approximation. The natural occurrence of indole
rings condensation assumed at the above tetrone model is
very unlikely, although it has been sometimes proposed, as
in the eumelanin pigment formed in the insect exocuticle
[31]."
So, the main chemical databases also have this issue, so that unless someone really looks into it, they're going to find the wrong structure. 
I think that best way forward is to just remove the infobox, but I expect someone will just restore it without really looking into it. --Lucaswilkins (talk) 14:43, 13 September 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Editing the infobox 

message: What are they the article only says that they are nitrogen free but what are they and what is the effect of them  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.222.180.90 (talk) 18:16, 9 May 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  What is allomelanin and pyomelanin 

message: what’s up with reference 0? Anyone know how to fix? JuanTamad (talk) 09:27, 18 November 2022 (UTC)
thread_title: reference 0?

message: | Pheomelanin, which is produced when melanocytes are malfunctioning due to derivation of the gene to its recessive format,
Perhaps my genetics is rusty, but not only is this sentence only present to insult red-heads, but i have not the faintest clue what derivation of the gene to its recessive format could possibly mean.
68.123.8.175 (talk) 21:01, 7 January 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  Gingers are defective, why not just say so? 

message: The quote in the introductory paragraph is fun, whoever wrote the piece being quoted is clearly enthusiastic about the mysteries of melanin, but is it useful for a lay audience? I feel like it misrepresents the significance of melanin in a larger context. It's not as if biology suffers from a lack of unknowns besides how melanin functions. Mabolle (talk) 10:39, 18 March 2024 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree, melanin is mysterious and a fruitful area for new research, no doubt, but so are several other different biomolecules I can name off the top of the top of my head… and “last remaining” frontiers? Aside from the fact that we’re nowhere near reaching the “last” frontiers of biology, when one does think of which mysteries will be the last to be solved one thinks of holy grails like cracking abiogenesis and such. 2804:14C:6590:4E59:7DDD:E23D:214B:BBE0 (talk) 02:30, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

text: It is a mere lyric fragment of the Nature magazine article (a quote, to say exactly), which serves as a source here. It means that melanin is not just a pigment, but it bears other functions, that we are getting to know about. They are described in the article. Probably, it should be rephrased. Tosha Langue (talk) 07:15, 23 April 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Frontiers with the unknown"