RoC Skincare is testing its Patented Clinical Retinol in adult female identical twins, pairing lifestyle biometric data collected from Oura Rings with clinical skin measurements in an effort to isolate what drives visible skin aging.
The brand has completed a pilot twin study and is moving to a larger phase: 30 pairs of identical twins aged 40 and older living in the US, following a regimen for 12 weeks. RoC expects results by mid-2027.
What the pilot showed
Art Pellegrino, chief scientific officer at RoC Skincare, said the pilot was designed primarily to prove the model — whether identical twins could offer a more precise way to study visible skin aging — and that the answer was yes. According to the brand, twins in the placebo group had similar or worse signs of aging at the end of the study, while twins in the treatment group saw as much as, or more than, 20% improvement in just four weeks.
Pellegrino said the pilot did not attempt to measure how much skin aging stems from genes versus lifestyle. That question is reserved for the expanded study, which aims to see how daily life — sleep and stress in particular — changes the picture when genetics are held constant.
Why identical twins
Because identical twins share DNA and much of their early environment, differences between them are harder to attribute to genetics, making lifestyle or product use the likelier explanation. "Identical twins are about as close as you get to a natural control," Pellegrino said.
Wearables plus clinical grading
Throughout the study, participants are asked to wear an Oura Ring, a wearable that tracks health and wellness metrics, to capture variation in biometric data such as sleep, stress, heart rate, heart rate variability and temperature trends. RoC's standard clinical skin measures assess signs of aging through expert grading, digital photography, corneometer readings and subject self-assessment.
- 30 pairs of adult female identical twins, aged 40 and older, based in the US
- 12-week regimen
- Oura Ring tracking of sleep, stress, heart rate, heart rate variability and temperature trends
- Expert grading, digital photography, corneometer readings and self-assessment
Because the brand cannot guarantee that twins share identical external influences such as sun exposure or diet, it is recruiting pairs with similar levels of environmental damage wherever possible and tracking lifestyle factors closely throughout. Pellegrino said this allows comparisons between sisters: if one twin sleeps poorly or is under more stress, researchers can examine whether her skin responds differently to the regimen.
RoC is also interested in the reverse question — whether participants who see visible improvements in their skin also feel less stressed.
Pellegrino described the phase as deliberately narrow: a focused group, he said, gives cleaner data to build on, and the brand treats it as one stage in a longer research program on extending skin span, or how long skin keeps looking its best. What the study learns, he added, will shape how RoC develops products for skin longevity and how it designs clinical studies going forward.