Stimulating hair growth possible within skin moles - study

The cure to baldness may have just been discovered within something called "nevi," which is the process where aged and pigment-making cells in the skin cause a quick growth of hair inside skin moles.

The discovery was made by researchers from the University of California, Irvine (UCI) and they published their study in the peer-reviewed journal Nature on Wednesday, where the study's authors describe how hair growth is activated inside skin nevi from osteopontin and CD44 molecules.

In the study, the researchers, hailing from a diverse array of countries such as China, France, Germany Korea and Japan, utilized genetic mouse models of nevi with pigmented skin spots. The mice involved that have the spots had hyperactivated hair stem cells and displayed quick hair growth. The skin nevi accumulated large amounts of aging pigment cells and displayed healthy hair growth. The mice heavily resembled observations that were reported in the human hairy skin nevi.

How hair stem cells were being activated

Upon the researchers finding that the senescent pigment cells produced high levels of osteopontin, they also found that hair stem cells had a matching receptor molecule called CD44. Then, molecular interaction between the two saw hair stem cells being activated - which resulted in robust growth of hair. Researchers looked at mouse models that did not have either of those genes in order to confirm the importance of the two molecules in the process.

“We found that senescent pigment cells produce large quantities of a specific signaling molecule called osteopontin, which causes normally dormant and diminutive hair follicles to activate their stem cells for the robust growth of long and thick hairs,” said Maksim Plikus, the study's lead corresponding author and UCI professor of developmental and cell biology.

“Senescent cells are typically viewed as detrimental to regeneration and are thought to drive the aging process as they accumulate in tissues throughout the body, but our research clearly shows that cellular senescence has a positive side to it.”

The research from the study could therefore also help with therapy that can treat androgenetic alopecia.