INTRODUCTION
The major role of surfactants in cleansing formulations is the removal of dirt accumulated on the human skin and hair. However, strong detergents may at the same time negatively affect the skin’s protective lipidic layers. Hence the need to search for milder natural surfactants from sustainable resources, e.g. from plant extracts. Saponins, belonging to the group of glycosides, where a non-polar aglycon (triterpenoid or steroid) is linked to 1-3 polar glycon (sugar) groups, are a good example of plant biosurfactants. Besides simply reducing surface/interfacial tension (similarly to the low molecular weight synthetic surfactants, LMWSS), they can also form highly surface-elastic adsorbed layers, outperforming several surface-active proteins (1–4). Their widespread presence in our daily diet (e.g. in soybeans, chickpeas, oat, asparagus, fenugreek, garlic, sugar beets, potatoes, tomatoes, onions, or even tea) (5) significantly alleviates the consumers concerns. On the other hand, many saponins exert biological activity, often related to their affinity to cholesterol and other lipids (6–9), making them suitable candidates for model membrane mimetics (10,11) and as active pharmaceutical and cosmeceutical ingredients (12–15).
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