Editorial: Review of Sci Amer Hair loss Article

Article by HairlossTalk.com

One of our loyal users known as "Trey" was kind enough to allow us to post this information on an article found in the latest issue of Scientific American (June 2001). We strongly suggest you pick up a copy yourself so that you can review the entire thing uninterrupted. The "clippings" below should give some peeks into the latest discoveries and insights in the medical community regarding the understanding of hair loss and hair growth. Enjoy ...The best news to me was that it played up on the fact that the follicles never die as once believed, but rather shrink and stay in the dormant stage. Also it's interesting to see the research that is being done on these various stages and how all of this ties in to the original formation of the follicles in an embryo. Also the tone of the article is positive regarding future treatments and the attitudes of those who are currently researching this (as you will see).

For those of you who are new to hair loss research some of this might sound like Greek, but many of you will understand exactly what is being said here. These quotes are taken from various parts of the article, and I divided the quotes into three main categories (Follicles Don't Die; Research Highlights; The Outlook)

~ Trey

The (MPB) Follicle Doesn't Die:

"The good biological news is that in the most common types of thinning, hair follicles don't die. In classic male- and female-pattern hair loss (androgenetic alopecia), for instance, follicles become miniaturized and their growing phase abbreviated; they then produce extremely short, fine hairs. 'Even guys who are bald still have little hairs on the top of their head,' explains Bruce. A Morgan of Harvard's Cutaneous Biology Research Center." (MS) p. 76

"Hair thinning generally happens not because follicles disappear, but because the ratio of follicles in the growing and non-growing phases shifts unfavorably. Also, many follicles in balding people shrink progressively, ultimately producing only small, colorless hairs." p. 74

"Baldness often arises not because follicles die but because they shrink and malfunction. Drugs that manipulate Wnts or other regulatory proteins might one day protect threatened follicles and prod shrunken ones into producing hair normally again." p. 72

"Last year Ronald G. Crystal of Weill Medical College of Cornell University found that when hair follicles in adult mice are induced to make the protein during the resting, telogen stage, the follicles shift prematurely into the hair-producing, anagen stage. Thus, sonic hedgehog can stimulate dormant follicles to begin producing hair." p. 79

"As researchers become more sophisticated in their knowledge of the molecular interactions underlying hair growth, they can begin animal testing of compounds that might restore order to deranged regulatory pathways and revive dormant follicles." p. 79

Research Highlights:

"To trace the molecular controls over any given process, scientists first need to know the basic outlines of the process itself. By 1995 microscopists and others had developed a good sketch of the incredible steps that lead to the formation of hair follicles in the developing embryo. They had also described the hair cycle -- the periodic phases during which follicles produce or stop producing hair; follicles undergo this cycle repeatedly in a lifetime." p. 72

"Anagen follows telogen. Early on some of the stem cells from the bulge divide and travel down along the basement membrane to become matrix or outer root sheath cells. Once formed, the matrix cells proliferate and ultimately give rise to the hair cells and the inner root sheath, repeating the steps that occur during the embryonic development. This repetition implies that the events of anagen are probably controlled by a number of the same signaling molecules that operate during development." p. 74

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