Hair Loss Research
Stem cell
research sprouts new hope for a baldness cure
The University of
Pennsylvania professor of medicine has used stem cells to grow hair on a
mouse than was born hairless. And he found the mouse's hair was absolutely
normal and healthy, pointing the way, he believes, to curing baldness in
people - a problem that affects more than 40 million men in the US alone.
Back around 1990, Dr.
Cosarelis found cells in the hair follicle of a mouse that seemed to be
stem cells. The problem at the time was that no one could prove it.
Now the techniques for
handling stem cells are far advance. He implanted some of these in a
hairless breed of lab mouse and the mouse grew follicles - and normal
hair.
The same thing, he believes,
would work in humans.
It might mean growing a
whole lot of the cells in a dish to serve as starter kits for new
follicles. It could involve combining individual stem cells to build a
follicle. It could mean simply implanting the individual follicle cells in
a bald patch and watching it grow.
In baldness, each follicle
shrinks dramatically, "to the point where it's still present but it's
really microscopic. The hair that's produced is not visible."
So far he has produced the
healthy hair only in mice, and there are many breakthrough that work in
mice but never quite do the job in humans.
Still, he believes,
transplanting stem cells from follicles on the back of the neck (where
hair stays healthy longer) to a bald spot seems promising and simpler than
transplanting whole follicles, and with no danger of rejection.
"There are actually
companies - at least three that I know of - that are trying to do this.
I'm sure they'll be interested. We'll start to see it at some point in the
future," he said in an interview.
Today's hair loss drugs
prevent the follicles from shrinking in first place. But they aren't much
use for someone who's already bald, he notes. And one type of baldness
drug cannot be used by women.
As well, he hopes to treat
burn victims. "Now when you have a burn - you've probably seen the
horrible scars from burns - the skin's not normal. It doesn't have hair
follicles, doesn't have sweat glands." This might lead to a way to
grow back hair.
-- Nature Biotechnology, March 15, 2004
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