Reversing Gray Hair: Promising Anti-Aging Techniques Explored by Scientists

2023-10-25 23:58:12
Faces that reflect resistance to the passing of the years, showing the promise and advances of anti-aging techniques. (Illustrative image Infobae)

Gray hair represents one of the most obvious signs of aging, which is why some people look for methods to hide it, such as hair dye. However, a team of scientists suggests that white hair can be reversed. To find out how, they began by looking for the cause of its appearance.

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Researchers at New York University (NYU) Grossman School of Medicine discovered that the key to gray hair lies in melanocyte stem cells (McSCs), which provide pigment.

According to their study, published in the Nature magazine, it was observed that in a healthy situation McSCs move between different compartments of the developing hair follicles in the research subjects, which were mice. These compartments allow McSCs to mature and acquire the protein that regenerates into pigment cells, allowing hair to continually color as it grows.

Gray hair represents one of the most common signs of aging. (Illustrative image Infobae)

However, in some cases, McSCs become trapped in a compartment of the hair follicle and cannot return to the germinal site, where WNT proteins promote their transformation into pigment cells. In this situation, in the absence of the coloring agent, gray hair appears.

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“It is the loss of the chameleon function of melanocyte stem cells that may be responsible for the appearance of gray hair and loss of hair color,” Professor Mayumi Ito, principal investigator of the study and explained in a press release. professor in the Ronald O. Perelman Department of Dermatology and the Department of Cell Biology at Langone Health, a NYU division.

Meanwhile, he clarifies that “these findings suggest that the motility and reversible differentiation of melanocyte stem cells are key to maintaining healthy and colored hair.”

MsSCs are stem cells that transform into melanocytes, which give pigment to the hair. (Freepik)

McSCs focus on pigment production and are distinct from the cells responsible for hair growth. Therefore, hair can continue to grow even without pigment. NYU research shows that as the hair growth process ages, the number of McSCs lodged in the follicle bulge continues to increase.

At some points, this non-pigment-producing follicle bulge contains approximately 50% of all McSCs.

The McSCs that remain mobile retained their ability to produce pigment, but due to the constant changes in the needs of the McSCs that decompose over time, the emergence of gray hair coincides with aging.

Although it is common for gray hair to appear in old age, in some people it appears at an early age. (Freepik)

And while stress has also been associated with graying hair, unrelated Harvard research indicates that stress simply accelerates the hair growth pattern, which also speeds up the aging process of hair follicles.

According to the NYU study, “for unknown reasons, the melanocyte stem cell system fails earlier than other adult stem cell populations, leading to graying hair in most humans and mice.”

The NYU team’s next step involves investigating how we can get the McSCs, once trapped, to move once more. Because once they move, they create pigment. And that might mean the end of gray hair.

The cells that produce pigment are different from those responsible for hair growth. (Freepik)

Finally, researchers also argue that studies like this bring us one step closer to a cure for cancer, as it expands our understanding of the function and regulation of stem cells in our body.

“We are interested in how the stem cells that reside in our body are regulated to maintain it properly and how they can reform tissues when they are lost through injury,” Ito had told NPR, adding that “when stem cell regulation goes out of control , we will have multiple health problems, including cancers.”

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