Retinol is a precursor to RA. When applied to human skin, it mediates all the effects that RA causes, but does so with much less skin irritation. Therefore, it is expected to be better tolerated by elderly skin than RA. In a seven day treatment study of elderly patients, retinol has been shown to induce mRNA levels of procollagen molecules in human skin in vivo. Therefore, it is hypothesized to improve the thin skin of elderly by increasing the synthesis of more collagen in both the photoaged, and hence improve BP, and the intrinsically aged human skin without causing significant irritant skin reaction.