Ten years ago they didn’t really exist. Now serums have carved such a gargantuan niche in our collective beauty psyche that to go without an intermediary application of something super-charged and active-heavy between cleansing, perhaps toning, and moisturising would be akin to stepping out of the house not wearing a bra.

First we obsessed over peptides - No7’s Protect & Perfect Intense Serum caused a stampede after the BBC’s Horizon programme declared that it actually did smooth wrinkles - and anything bearing the word Matrixyl.  Then the holy grail, collagen.  But when we realised collagen was just too large a molecule to penetrate deep into our skin, the love affair with Retinol – by way of Alpha-H & RoC Retinol Correction – began, closely followed by a dalliance with marine algae, enter Crème de La Mer’s Concentrate and Astalift Jelly Aquarysta, and finally back to retinol once more. Phew. What a ride.

Really, there are just two key factors that determine a serum’s success or failure - the quality and amount of ingredients and how far said substances can penetrate into the skin. For this, beauty brands have borrowed their science from the cutting edge of medicine and top-secret labs at the likes of NASA, no less.  And let’s be honest, if you’re investing £100+ on a 30ml vial of skincare, you want to know it’s going to make a difference to the way you look when you roll out of bed in the morning. With that in mind, we’ve collated our ten best investment serums new to the market for 2014. Use them regularly and they will, albeit gradually, start to change the way you look and feel about your skin.

Click through the gallery above to see ten of the best new skin serums for 2014.