Researchers have discovered that indoor tanning may accelerate genetic aging in the skin, leaving young users with more cancer-linked mutations than people decades older.
People who use tanning beds have long been known to face a greater risk of skin cancer. New research now shows that young adults who tan indoors experience genetic changes in their skin that may cause their cells to accumulate more mutations than those found in people who are twice as old.
The findings come from a study led by UC San Francisco and Northwestern University, published in Science Advances.
“We found that tanning bed users in their 30s and 40s had even more mutations than people in the general population who were in their 70s and 80s,” said Bishal Tandukar, PhD, a UCSF postdoctoral scholar in Dermatology who is the co-first author of the study. “In other words, the skin of tanning bed users appeared decades older at the genetic level.”
Skin Cancer and Rising Melanoma Rates
These types of genetic changes can increase the risk of skin cancer, which the American Cancer Society identifies as the most common cancer in the U.S. One form, melanoma, represents only about 1% of all skin cancer cases but is responsible for the majority of deaths. Each year, roughly 11,000 Americans die from melanoma, with ultraviolet radiation being the primary cause.
Ultraviolet radiation is produced naturally by the sun and is also emitted by artificial light sources like tanning beds. In recent years, melanoma rates have climbed alongside increased tanning bed use. This rise has been especially pronounced among young women, who make up the largest share of the indoor tanning market.
Numerous countries effectively ban tanning beds, and the World Health Organization classifies them as a group 1 carcinogen, the same category as tobacco smoke and asbestos, but tanning beds remain legal and popular in the U.S.
Evidence From Skin Cell Analysis
In their study, the authors looked at the medical records of more than 32,000 dermatology patients, including their tanning bed usage, history of sunburn, and family history of melanoma. They also obtained skin samples from 26 donors and sequenced 182 cells.
The young tanning bed users had more skin mutations than people twice their age, especially in their lower backs, an area that does not get much damage from sunlight but has a great deal of exposure from tanning beds.
“The skin of tanning bed users was riddled with the seeds of cancer — cells with mutations known to lead to melanoma,” said senior author A. Hunter Shain, PhD, associate professor in the UCSF Department of Dermatology.
“We cannot reverse a mutation once it occurs, so it is essential to limit how many mutations accumulate in the first place,” said Shain, whose laboratory focuses on the biology of skin cancer. “One of the simplest ways to do that is to avoid exposure to artificial UV radiation.”
Reference: “Molecular effects of indoor tanning” by Pedram Gerami, Bishal Tandukar, Delahny Deivendran, Shantel Olivares, Limin Chen, Jessica Tang, Tuyet Tan, Harsh Sharma, Aravind K. Bandari, Noel Cruz-Pacheco, Darwin Chang, Annika L. Marty, Adam Olshen, Natalia Faraj Murad, Jing Song, Jungwha Lee, Iwei Yeh and A. Hunter Shain, 12 December 2025, Science Advances.
DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.ady4878
The study was supported by the National Cancer Institute (R01 CA265786); the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases (AR080626); the Department of Defense Melanoma Research Program (ME210014); and the Melanoma Research Alliance.
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1 Comment
Its been clearly evident for decades that going to the tanning salon is bad for you just by using your eyeballs.
Skin looks visibly horrible and leathery.