Hair Loss - Let's focus on the FUNDAMENTALS, not the little details

classified ads


shop
Forum News Hair Transplant Hair Replacement Topical All Natural Drugs Hair Multiplication Gallery Female Hair Loss

Hair Loss

Forum Index   Personal Journal   Poll

Log in | User | Register

Search:  
Back to forum
Board view

FREE Hair Transplant Consultations with HDC: London - Sep 22-25
 click here
 

Let's focus on the FUNDAMENTALS, not the little details (Topicals)

posted by haroldo, 18.04.2008, 10:32

I think I hate this forum. Thats the 2nd long reply I have lost in a couple of days. This one seemed to go through. Anyway...


» » » Sure, it's more upstream than a TGF-beta inhibitor would be,
» » » but I want to go ALL the way upstream where that first little
» » » creek starts to form! ;-)
» »
» » I think I know what you mean by upstream now.
»
» You weren't completely sure what I meant by "upstream" until now?? :-)

Well technically the androgen is the most upstream signal in this process. There is nothing upstream of that as the term upstream and downstream is used in terms of signal transduction. But now I know that you meant a developmental stage that occured before the hair follicle cells had committed to becoming hair follicle cells.

» » Its not what people mean
» » when they talk about upstream or downstream in terms of signal
» transduction
» » but I think you are talking about the developmental stage as in "why
» does a
» » skin cell become a skin cell? why does a hair cell become a hair cell?
» why
» » does a scalp hair become a scalp hair etc"
»
» Ummm...once again, I'm talking about the SPECIFIC genetic and biochemical
» reasons that cause a hair follicle to become either STIMULATED by
» androgens, or SUPPRESSED by them. How can there be any confusion about
» what I mean??
Because what causes keratinocytes to be either stimulated or inhibited is the alphabet soup of cytokines etc released by the dermal papilla when it makes contact with DHT etc. But what causes a dermal papilla to become the type that reacts in one way rather than the other is another question.

» » If thats so then....I dont really think
» » that stuff is going to be of much use to us. They might be
» » useful for engineering people without hairloss or hair multiplication
» » but otherwise i dont see how it helps so much as the horse as already
» » bolted so to speak.
»
» Before you make any predictions about how un-useful it's going to turn out
» to be, let's actually FIND OUT what the reasons are. It may or may not be
» all that amenable to treatment once we find out, but let's cross that
» bridge when we come to it.
OK. But what causes one type to become one or the other has already been and gone by the time we are here to worry about it. Causing one hair follicle to change into another type of hair follicle once they have diffferentiated is like getting a skin cell to change into a muscle cell. Possible in the test tube perhaps but very tricky at the least in vivo.

» » » » No. They respond in opposite fashions because they express
» » » » proteins that have opposite effect on keratinocytes. Thats it.
» » »
» » » Ok. Now tell me WHY they do that! :-)
» »
» » They do that for the same reason that skin cells transcribe whatever
» » proteins they do in response to androgens just as cells of the prostate
» do.
» » Because those are the genes that will be expressed in response to
» androgens
» » in those cell types.
»
» And WHY are those the genes that will be expressed in response to
» androgens in those cell types??? I'm trying to get you to understand that
» we have to find out the SPECIFIC BIOCHEMICAL REASONS for those responses,
» Harold, and all you're doing is saying in effect, "that's just the way they
» are". You've got to do a LOT better than that!! :-D
»
» What if they had said in 1963, "Look, we just CAN'T go to the moon, it's
» impossible, and that's just the way it is"?? :-P

Indeed. But what if they had said "Lets not go to the moon with a crappy rocket - lets work on teleportation" :)
I really think understanding the alphabet soup stuff is the best, most versatile and most powerful way to approach it. And its something thats achievable in the not too distant future. we are pretty close now. And if you can manipulate those proliferative/inhibitory signals then you can make any hairs grow or not grow as thick or thin as you like. Whereas you might end up with androgen dependent scalp hairs if you tried to flip that genetic switch before the cells had made up there mind what they wanted to be. Engineering an individual to have scalp hairs that did not express androgen receptors would be the most elegant solution but this is not feasible at this point. It might be interesting to people at follica who are creating new follicles (a place where the alphabet soup and the developmental stage go hand in hand) but otherwise I think the idea of a honest to goodness "super-minox" is much more feasible.

» » But I now see more what you are getting at with I think.
»
» I don't know any different ways to say it. I've been making this same
» point throughout this thread, and also on all the hairloss sites for years.
» I don't know why you've had trouble understanding what I'm saying.
»
» » That you are interested in why some hairs express growth factors etc.
» But
» » with the evidence that androgens can destroy even occipital hairs in
» high
» » enough concentration I think theres a fair chance that all scalp hairs
» are
» » set up in such a way and that the differences in balding between
» different
» » areas of the scalp and different people could pretty much be explained
» in
» » terms of androgen receptor expression/sensitivity and local androgen
» levels
» » as is already the case.
»
» Exactly. But as I've said before, that doesn't particularly interest me
» because it's obvious and trivial. I want to know what accounts for the
» completely OPPOSITE response to androgens from one hair follicle to
» another, depending on body location.
OK. I suspect the answer wont be particularly profound though. Its always good to understand more about the process though and I am interested in the question of whether all scalp hair reacts in the same way as balding mens if it expresses androgen receptors that are sufficiently stimulated. A question I hadnt really considered before.

» » At any rate since dermal papillae wherein the bad
» » response originates are not replaced fromm cycle to cycle I dont think
» » there is that much that could be done to fundamentally change a "bad
» one"
» » to a "good one" them even if there are such things.
»
» Again, that's just speculation. Let's actually FIND OUT what accounts for
» the difference, before we go and declare that there's no way to change a
» hair follicle from one kind to another.
Fair enough.

» » » Harold, come on, man. Pull your head out of the sand.
» »
» » I think I understand what you are saying now.
»
» Thank God! :-)

It may have taken me a while but I am glad I got there in the end :)

» » At the same time, unless you
» » are planning to replace most of your existing follicles with new ones a
» la
» » Follica then I think you have to look at all that alphabet soup stuff.
» Cos
» » once that follicle has developed in such a way that it is going to
» produce
» » those genes in response to androgen you either have to keep it away
» from
» » androgens, interfere with the resulting production of those genes or
» » introduce a growth factor or other third party that is powerful enough
» to
» » overcome those negative signals.
»
» Time will tell. Until then, I'm certainly not going to assume that
» there's no way to make one little alteration in the response of a hair
» follicle to a specific hormone.
In the meantime we will convert you to the way of the alphabet soup and have you digging through all those studies on TGF-Beta/wnt/EDAR etc :)
hh


haroldo is located in [NA] and he is available to meet: NO

Post reply
 

Complete thread:

Back to forum
Board view
36357 Postings in 3361 Threads, 1561 registered users
Hair Loss | Admin contact
powered by MLF | FORUM POLICY

Dr. Klein's REMOX: most comprehensive topical hair loss therapy
click here