Men’s Health – Researchers have developed a new drug that regrows hair by reactivating dormant hair follicle cells.
The approach is different than current treatments, which only slow down hair loss. It reactivates hair follicles by boosting the body’s natural availability of lactate, which directly affects the follicles’ ability to grow hair.
Safety trials are done and a trial to test its effectiveness is planned for next year.
For millennia, thick, healthy hair has symbolized both masculine virility and feminine appeal. So when hair thins or disappears altogether—which happens to approximately 80 percent of men and 50 percent of women—the hit to self-esteem can feel almost existential.
Soon, however, hair loss sufferers might have a new option in their toolkit. And if early results hold up, this drug could prove to be the most effective solution yet.
That’s because unlike existing treatments like minoxidil and finasteride, which merely slow down hair loss, PP405 sparks new hair growth.
“PP405 wakes up dormant hair follicles, so the mechanism is very different,” says Heather Christofk, Ph.D., a biochemist at UCLA, whose lab helped develop the molecule. Their work is published in the journal Nature Cell Biology.
Typically, hair toggles through phases of activity and rest, governed by the hair-follicle stem cells. In periods of activity, these cells awaken and regenerate the hair follicle, developing into the different components that make up hair.
But when they’re resting, the hair stops growing and eventually falls out. With illness, stress, or an unlucky roll of the genetic dice, these stem cells can become permanently dormant.
But Christofk and her collaborator, William Lowry, Ph.D., a stem cell biologist at UCLA, discovered a way to wake them back up.
“We found that hair follicle stem cells have a really different metabolism when they’re asleep versus when they’re active and giving rise to new hair,” Christofk says …
