Many experts think a hair-cloning procedure, may be less than 5 years away.
Intercytex, a public company based in London, may be closest to a marketable product. Intercytex scientists have successfully grown large batches of cloned proto-hairs similar to those that other researchers have been struggling to keep alive.
What’s more, in animal experiments, the Intercytex team has observed cloned hair follicles growing hair again after the original hairs were plucked. This suggests that their cloned follicles cycle through the entire life span of hair—three phases known as anagen (growth), catagen (transitional), and telogen (resting)—something no other researchers have been able to do.
A key to the team’s success has been growing proto-hairs in a special medium, licensed from a Japanese inventor, which contains cultured skin cells known as keratinocytes.
Hair cloning will be pricey initially, so early adopters may be men who are not only wealthy, but also desperate because they don’t have enough hair left to do a follicular unit transplant. Cloning could also be ideal for younger men who aren’t good candidates for follicular grafting.
Nobody is sure how the actual cloning process will be implemented. Most surgeons speculate that they’ll use boring tools similar to the existing ones used for harvesting follicular units. The follicular units will be sent to centralized labs, where industrial incubators will mass-produce millions of follicle cells for a relatively low cost.
Another question is how will the cloned cells be transplanted? Instead of transplanting follicular units, your surgeon may inject cloned cells into micro-incisions, or he may implant lab-grown hair follicles. It could be fast, clean, and painless.
Whatever the outcome, choices will abound. In the future, hair cloning will coexist alongside follicular unit transplants, drug therapies, and emerging technologies still incubating in the labs.
This news is brought to your courtesy of Dr. Mark Bishara and The Paragon Med Spa
(817) 473-2120
Posts
Scientists appear to have moved one step closer to a solution for hair loss. For the first time, researchers have been able to grow entirely new hairs on human skin.
The new technique would be drastically different than current treatment options available for hair loss, as it would use people’s own cells to generate new hair. In the study, researchers removed cells from the base of human hair follicles and grew them in drops hanging down from the lid of a petri dish. They then injected the cells into hairless human skin that had been grafted onto mice. In five out of the seven grafts, new hair follicles grew. Further tests confirmed that the follicles were human.
But baldness hasn’t been solved just yet. The type of hair produced was very small and fine, according to researchers. Only 22% of the genes that normally operate in follicular cells were functioning in the grafted cells. More work needs to be done to see if longer, thicker, better quality hair can be grown, but researchers are optimistic that an effective treatment for baldness can be developed.
Current treatments for baldness do not involve producing new hairs. Hair transplants, for example, simply shift hair by moving follicles from the back of the head to the front, leaving scars on the back of the head, which may be a particularly unappealing option for women. Other treatments focus on trying to revitalize existing or dying hair follicles, rather than on growing entirely new follicles. This new technique could theoretically be used in both men and women suffering from hair loss.
This news is brought to you courtesy of Dr. Mark Bishara and The Paragon Med Spa
(817) 473-2120
- Scientists have found a way of cloning the cells that contain the ‘instruction manual’ for growing new hair
- The lab-grown cells sprout hair when put back into human skin
- Treatment could be cheaper than hair transplants currently are
Baldness could soon be nothing more than a bad memory, thanks to a breakthrough by British scientists.
In research that could ‘transform’ the treatment of hair loss, they have found a way of cloning the tiny cells that contain the ‘instruction book’ for growing new hair.
In a world first, they have shown that when these lab-grown cells are put back into human skin, they sprout hair.
Scientists have found a way of cloning the tiny cells that contain the ‘instruction book’ for growing new hair in a breakthrough that could spell the end of hair transplants such as strip method.
Although the work is at an early stage, the scientists from Durham University in the UK and Columbia University in the US, say it represents a real breakthrough in treating the hair loss that blights millions of men and women.
Options at the moment are limited to drugs and hair transplants. But drugs can have side-effects and hair transplants simply work with what is there, by redistributing existing hair.
In contrast, the new technique should actually boost the number of hairs on the head.
The team began by taking strips of human hair and extracting tiny cells called dermal papillae.
Found in clumps at the base of a hair, these cells contain the ‘instruction book’ for the growth of new hair.
The scientists then cloned the cells in a dish, until they had multiple copies of each one.
Other scientists have done this before but then failed to get the lab-grown cells to sprout hair when put back into skin.
The UK-US team got over this hurdle by turning the dish of cells upside down, to encourage them to form into the clumps found in nature. The clumps were then transplanted into human skin that had been grafted on the backs of mice. Once there, they sent out the instructions needed for new hairs to grow.
Cells from all seven human donors sprouted fledgling hairs and, in two or three cases, the tufts broke through the skin, the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences reports.
The new hairs were white but Durham researchers say it should possible to produce coloured hair in future.
Starting with a sample of a person’s own cells should also mean that any new hair is a good match in terms of texture and curliness.
It is hoped that the first human trials will start soon and that men and women will both eventually benefit from the new treatment. Researchers have shown that when the lab-grown cells are put back into human skin, they sprout hair.
It is too early to say exactly how much it will cost but it could be cheaper than hair transplants.
Burns victims could also benefit, as replacement skin that is studded with hairs should be more functional than a completely smooth covering.
Although baldness is usually thought of as a male problem, some eight million British women are losing their hair.
Treatments are still years away, but the reasearch is exciting.
This news is broughy to you courtesy of Dr. Mark Bishara and The Paragon Med Spa.
Cosmetic Surgeon Dr. Mark A. Bishara, M.D., serving Fort Worth, Arlington, and the surrounding area.
Stay Connected
