Doc,

Give me some straight dope on when you think hair cloning will be available. Meaning, by whatever method, the donor supply goes up. Please give me some kind of guess. You got to have some idea based on what you’ve seen research wise. An educated guess would be greatly appreciate for me and my follicularly challenged brethren.

The 10 year timeline that has been used for well over 10 years now keeps moving.

Unfortunately, I have no more insight into hair cloning progress than you have. The research is ongoing, and I will continue to post anything and everything that I can find about it. I am keeping no secrets.

Snippet from the article:

We may now be a hair’s breadth away from a cure for baldness. For the first time, new human hairs have been coaxed into growing from specialised skin cells that can be multiplied in number to potentially create a full head of hair.

Hair-raising remedies for hair loss currently consist of hormonal drugs to slow the process and hair transplants – where a section of hair follicles is moved from one area of the head to another. Finding a way to grow more hair, however, has proved difficult.

Hair growth in adults occurs naturally in a process known as hair neogenesis – where cells called dermal papilla cells that span the top two layers of skin coax surrounding cells to form hair follicles. One reason hair loss occurs is when papillae stop working.

Read the rest at New Scientist — 3D drops raise hopes of cure for baldness

I posted a few links about this research last month, but I just read this article in New Scientist about the recent work by Dr. Colin Jahoda, who presented this material at the 2013 ISHRS meeting, and wanted to write a bit more about it.

The key to his findings was his ability to produce hair by growing dermal papilla cells in a 3D manner. The process starts with the isolation of the dermal papilla cells, then let them grow and multiply so that their numbers increase. These cells are obtained from discarded hair transplant tissue and once put into a nutrient broth, some 30 hours later, each drop of solution contains about 3000 dermal papilla cells. These cells were injected into neonatal foreskin which is known to be hairless, easily available as it is taken from babies who were circumcised. The donor cells comes from between 5-7 patients. After about 6 weeks of growth in a 3D matrix solution there is growth and some hair actually can be seen.

Dr. Jahoda believes that the key to his success was the use of a 3D matrix for growing the dermal papilla. The dermal papilla cells reprogram the skin cells as they grow and these reprogrammed cells form hair follicles. He believes that this will eventually lead to “hair cloning” therapies and the end result, he hopes, will not even require a surgical procedure like hair transplantation. Now that he knows which genes need to be expressed, drugs might even be developed that can reactivate the dermal papilla precursors in the scalp of balding people. Dr. Melanie McDowell from the University of Adelaide in Australia said, “The cool thing about hair follicles is you already have the channel into them, so topical creams have a good chance of getting down into where they’re needed.”

I would expect that this would take years to identify the appropriate drug and then take the process through the FDA. For our audience reading this post, please be patient and give the researchers some room to finish defining the process and finding that “magic cream” they are looking for.

Snippet from the article:

In the new study, Christiano and her colleagues sought to figure out how to take hair cells from the body, clone them and then reinsert them back into the body where they’ll grow new hair from new follicles. The process falls apart because the cells lose the ability to instruct the skin to make new hair, she explained.

In the new study, researchers found that the cells retain their ability to figure out what to do when the researchers grow the cells upside down. “We don’t put genes into them, and they’re not manipulated at all,” Christiano noted.

The hair cells produced by the process were able to produce new hair in five out of seven donor models of human skin, she said, although there’s more work to be done to make them fully develop hair the way they should.

Read the rest — Researchers Report Progress With Growing Hair

This is quite exciting, especially considering the two individuals who pioneered the work (Drs. Christiano and Jahoda). Keep in mind that this research is still very early and is not a cure for hair loss, but the findings and the techniques are impressive.

Other articles speak to the technique very well:

• LA Times – New Technique Holds Promise for Hair Growth
• Columbia University – Hair Regeneration Method is First to Induce New Human Hair Growth

Snippet from the press release:

Histogen, Inc., a regenerative medicine company developing innovative therapies based on the products of cells grown under simulated embryonic conditions, today announced that the United States Patent & Trademark Office has issued patent 8,535,913, entitled “Soluble Composition for Promoting Hair Growth Produced by Hypoxic Culture of Fibroblast Cells”.

The patent, which is the fourth US patent issued to the Company, covers the liquid composition of proteins and cofactors that is secreted by multipotent stem cells through Histogen’s technology process, and the method of administering that composition to stimulate hair growth. Histogen’s Hair Stimulating Complex (HSC), covered by this new patent, is in clinical development as an injectable treatment for male pattern and female diffuse hair loss.

Read the rest — Histogen’s Composition for Hair Growth Receives US Patent

interested in hair cloning. is anyone doing this now? I know aderans completed phase 3 trials. but I was wondering if anyone outside united states is already doing this successfully of course.

thanks

There are no proven cases where hair cloning has been performed successfully as a clinical treatment.

Snippet from the press release:

RepliCel Life Sciences Inc. is pleased to announce that it has received issue notification from the United States Patent and Trademark Office with respect to RepliCel’s technology for preparing populations of dermal sheath cup cells for its hair regeneration procedure. These cells are used to treat patients suffering from androgenetic alopecia, also known as pattern hair loss. With the issuance of this patent, RepliCel will now have patents issued in the United States, Australia and the European Union. Additional patent applications, further protecting and expanding on our technology, are pending in the European Union, Canada, Japan, the United States, as well as other countries.

Read the rest — RepliCel Receives Issue Notification from the United States Patent and Trademark Office Protecting Methods of Preparing Dermal Sheath Cup Cells for Its Hair Regeneration Technology

I don’t know what it means for the viability of hair regeneration, but they are proud to announce they’re getting patents on their technology.

dear doctor

i have heard about the news of replicel. i searched their website and found something weird. In their paper, there are two photos in the first page, but i cannot see any change in hair density as they claim. Can you explain it to me? thanks

RepliCel PDF

I do not know much about this, but based on what you linked to, it looks like they are proposing to test 108 men in phase 2 (it does not seem like this has been done). As they word it, it is “anticipated that implanted cells will migrate to damaged or dormant follicles and help rejuvenate them“. They do not mention the science. They seem to stress the monetary dollar amount of the hair loss market (more so than the science), so they are likely looking for investors.

Finally, I do not see much hair density in the photo myself, at least not visibly/cosmetically. Perhaps someone else more informed about RepliCel can provide more.