Emollient

Pressed from the seed of Ricinus communis, castor oil is the one common vegetable oil that will dissolve the staining dyes used in lipstick, which is how it became the liquid backbone of the bullet.

A volatile silicone ring of five repeating units, used as a carrier that spreads a product evenly and then evaporates, and now restricted in European cosmetics on environmental rather than dermatological grounds.

A synthetic silicone fluid sold in every viscosity from thinner than water to a cuttable gum, valued in cosmetics for spreading further than an oil of the same thickness and for leaving a dry rather than a greasy surface.

A branched twelve-carbon hydrocarbon that works as a volatile solvent: it thins a formulation during application and then evaporates completely, leaving the pigment and the film former behind.

Not an oil but a liquid wax of long-chain esters, close enough in structure to sperm whale oil that it became the industrial substitute after the United States banned sperm whale oil imports in 1971.

The greasy secretion sheep make to keep their fleece from rotting in the rain, recovered from wool-scouring liquor: chemically a wax rather than a fat, despite the old pharmacy name wool fat.

The semi-solid mixture of saturated hydrocarbons left when refined petroleum residue is dewaxed; it forms a barrier film that slows water loss, and under Regulation (EC) No 1223/2009 the European Union permits it in cosmetics only where its refining history is documented.

The fully hydrogenated form of squalene, a hydrocarbon the human body makes on its way to cholesterol and secretes in sebum; saturating it removes the six double bonds that let the parent go rancid.