In her new role, McGeechan coordinates and aligns Lonza’s hygiene and preservation research, development and technical service.
She will work to enhance the company’s application and formulation skills to provide customers with integrated solutions; and drive innovation to build industry expertise and enhance Lonza’s functional ingredient offerings.
Preservatives - a crisis?
Demand for effective and safe preservative ingredients has never been higher, but with consumers and regulators alike turning against some established synthetic preservatives, the industry has had a hefty task on its hands.
We caught up with Barbara Brockway, formulation expert and director of personal care at AppliedDNA Sciences, in an interview last year on what she called a ‘preservative crisis’ for the industry.
“The preservative crisis in the cosmetic industry is very real. Regulated markets such as the EU, have restricted positive lists of the preservatives, that are authorised for use in cosmetics under the conditions specified. The problem is, these lists are getting shorter,” she explained.
“The positive list of preservatives under the EU Cosmetic Products Regulation ((EC) No. 1223/2009), is ‘closed’ at the moment and animal testing bans etc. make it very difficult to get new preservatives accepted onto these lists.
“Formulators are seeing themselves running out of allowed preservatives and to make the situation worse, by relying on fewer authorised preservatives, we are in danger of entering a vicious circle that could result in more preservatives being removed from these positive lists.”
Innovation in this area is a key focus for the beauty and personal care industry.
Profile: Lonza’s new head of preservation tech
In her 29 years of experience with Lonza and its predecessor companies, McGeechan has held various positions in R&D and technical service, with technical responsibility for biocides research, formulation development and customer service.
McGeechan has several patents issued relating to antimicrobials and biocides in applications ranging from metalworking fluids to preservatives.
She earned a B.Sc. degree in Biochemistry from the University of Manchester (UK).