These are the "studies" etc that I'm aware of. At least one is of the same small group of ppl but it's the 12 month mark.
http://www.thecosmeticsite.com/formulat ... 59971.html
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/quer ... t=Abstract
http://www.ehrs.org/conferenceabstracts ... mimura.htm
http://www.ehrs.org/conferenceabstracts ... ahashi.htm
http://web.archive.org/web/200202201144 ... 991101.htm
Some more info from them:
"When we first looked at the original lab formula that grew new hair in the
clinical trials, we had the same thought about the alcohol. The lab formula
was 10% ethanol. Our first attempts at formulations with no alcohol were
unsuccessful, in several ways. The color was unstable, the "fragrance" was
unpleasant, and the polyphenols would not stay in solution over time.
We worked backward from the 10% until we found a far lower alcohol content
that would still retain the characteristics we required. We found that less
than 3% was enough to stabilize the formula.
Chemically, plant phenolics are essentially natural alcohols. (They're not
classified as alcohols only because the hydroxyl group is not bonded to a
saturated carbon atom).
The propylene glycol is a trace amount, just enough to stabilize the
fragrance. Propolene glycol is a transdermal vector- more might increase
penetration. To produce a PG-free formula might be possible down the road,
but we'd have to beat the fragrance problem some other way. So far, we
haven't found anything better."
