A cure for baldness could be around the corner. A Japanese team of researchers has successfully grown hair follicles in a laboratory, giving hope that before long they will be able to do so on human heads as well.
The hair follicles created by the scientists produced long strands of hair.
Read More »Short time span
The tiny organs developed by the scientists produced fully mature follicles that were about 3 millimeters (0.12 inches) in length within the relatively short time span of 23 days. The strands continued to grow, providing the scientists the opportunity to examine the growth first-hand, giving them even more insights into the process of hair growth.
In addition, the scientists improved the hair color by adding a drug that increases the amount of melanin, a natural pigment, to the hair.
Full heads of hair?
Such long-sprouting natural hair raises the image of full heads of hair on people who had assumed they would be bald for life. Some two in every five men are affected in some way by hair loss.
It also gives hope to those who suffer from male pattern baldness as well as other forms of hair loss, including androgenic alopecia that is found in women as well as men. About half of women over the age of 65 are estimated to suffer from female pattern baldness.
Losing a large amount of hair also can be harmful to mental health for men and women.
Today many people turn to supplements, wigs, and a wide variety of treatments for help with their hair loss, some of which are more effective than others. Few developments have proved as successful as growing new strands of hair on a human scalp would do, however.
Next step
The next step is to use cells from people, explains Jungi Fukuda, a professor at the faculty of engineering at Yokohama National University.
After that, the team will apply to make their findings relevant to regenerative medicine and drug development, Fukuda adds.
Animal models
Up to now scientists have explored the mechanisms that relate to the development of hair growth using animal models with varying degrees of success. The significance of the success achieved by the Japanese scientists is that they were able to produce the follicles in a culture dish in a laboratory. By doing so the scientists were better able to understand and closely watch the development of tissues and organs involved in the process of hair development.
Miniature organs
The development involves the creation of tiny organs, called organoids, that are simple versions of an organ. Each hair follicle consists of such a miniature organ that follows its own cycle of regression, growth, and rest through the course of our lifetimes.
Such organoids offered a promising tool to illustrate the mechanism behind the creation of hair follicles in a test tube, outside a human body, explains Tatsuto Kageyama, an assistant professor in the faculty of engineering at Yokohama National University.
In addition to the creation of real hair, the researchers looked at the possibilities that the creation of organoids holds for regenerative medicine and drug screening.
The research team members believe that their findings also could be relevant to the processes that are at work in other organ systems in the body.
So much so that the principles uncovered in this study could one day be used to grow new teeth.
The paper is published in Science Advances.
