Ultraviolet (UV)-induced photoaging skin has become an urgent issue. The functional foods and cosmetics aiming to improve skin photoaging are developing rapidly, and the demand is gradually increasing year by year. Collagen peptides have been proven to display diverse physiological activities, such as excellent moisture retention activity, hygroscopicity, tyrosinase inhibitory activity and antioxidant activity, which indicates that they have great potential in amelioration of UV-induced photoaging. The main objective of this article is to recap the main mechanisms to improve photoaging skin by collagen peptides and their physiological activities in photo-protection. Furthermore, the extraction and structural characteristics of collagen peptides are overviewed. More importantly, some clinical trials on the beneficial effect on skin of collagen peptides are also discussed. In addition, prospects and challenges of collagen peptides are emphatically elucidated in this review. This article implies that collagen peptides have great potential as an effective ingredient in food and cosmetics industry with a wide application prospect.

紫外线 (UV) 引起的光老化皮肤已成为一个紧迫的问题。旨在改善皮肤光老化的功能性食品和化妆品发展迅速，需求量逐年增加。胶原蛋白肽已被证明具有多种生理活性，如优异的保湿活性、吸湿性、酪氨酸酶抑制活性和抗氧化活性，表明它们在改善紫外线诱导的光老化方面具有巨大潜力。本文的主要目的是回顾胶原蛋白肽改善光老化皮肤的主要机制及其在光保护中的生理活性。此外，还概述了胶原蛋白肽的提取和结构特征。更重要的是，还讨论了一些关于胶原蛋白肽对皮肤有益作用的临床试验。此外，本综述着重阐述了胶原蛋白肽的前景和挑战。本文暗示胶原蛋白肽作为食品和化妆品行业的有效成分具有巨大的潜力，具有广泛的应用前景。