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Hairy hope for baldies London:
No need to lose any more sleep over losing your hair, for even if
you do lose your luscious locks, you may some time soon be able to regrow
all, if not more, of your crowning glory. And this hope is held out
buy Swiss researchers, who have discovered that with the progeny of
a single hair stem cell, it would be theoretically possible to generate
the complete hair bulb of a human being. The research team led by Yann
Barrandon at the EPFL (Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne) and
the CHUV (Lausanne University Hospital) has discovered that certain
cells inside the hair follicle are true multipotent stem cells, capable
of developing into the many different cell types needed for hair growth
and follicle replacement, and posted their findings in an article appearing
in the Oct 3 advance online edition of the Proceedings of the National
Academy of Sciences. In 2001, Barrandon was part of a French research
team who reported in the scientific journal Cell, that stem cells could
be used to generate skin containing hair and sebaceous glands in mice.
But it was unclear at that time,whether the stem cells in hair follicles
were true stem cells, capable of long-term renewal, or multipotent progenitor
cells that would not permanently engraft in the follicle. The Swiss
researchers have answered that question, using rat whisker hair follicles
to demonstrate that the clonogenic keratinocytes in hair follicles are
indeed true stem cells. After isolating stem cells from rat whisker
follicles, labelling them, and growing them in culture for 140 generations,
the researchers found that the transplanted cells participated in the
hair cycle over long periods of time, showing that they are true multipotent
stem cells and not progeniture cells. "With the progeny of a single
stem cell, it would be theoretically possible to generate the complete
hair bulb of a human being, and one that would last for years," Barrandon
explained. The ability of the stem cells in hair follicles to repeatedly
regenerate all the different cell types of the follicle and sebaceous
glands has important implications for regenerative medicine, say the
researchers, and that the method could one day be used to regenerate
hair on patients with severe burns. References: India Travel Times, News, Hotels, Airlines, Indian, Tourism, Tourist, Tour, Ayurveda, Yoga, Hotel |
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