A breakthrough by scientists could mean women may never have to worry about going grey, gracefully or otherwise.
Heralding the end of messy hair dye and concerns over concealing silver roots, a study published FASEB, the journal for biological research, found people who are going grey develop “massive oxidative stress”, which causes hair to bleach itself from the inside out due to an accumulation of hydrogen peroxide in the hair follicle.
Finding the cause for grey hair means a cure could also be just around the corner.
“For generations, numerous remedies have been concocted to hide grey hair but now, for the first time, an actual treatment that gets to the root of the problem has been developed,” FASEB Journal editor-in-chief Gerald Weissman said.
The treatment may also be helpful to patients suffering skin condition vitiligo, the condition made famous by Michael Jackson, which causes a loss of pigmentation in the skin.
“This condition, while technically cosmetic, can have serious socio-emotional effects of people,” Mr Weissman said.
“Developing an effective treatment for this condition has the potential to radically improve many people’s lives.”
A treatment is expected to be made commercially available in the near future, in the form of a lotion.
The study’s author, Professor Karin Schallreuter from Bradford University said helping vitiligo sufferers and those going grey to regain pigment would have remarkable effects on their quality of life.
“To date, it is beyond any doubt that the sudden loss of the inherited skin and localised hair colour can affect those individuals in many fundamental ways,” she said.
“The improvement of quality of life after total and even partial successful re-pigmentation has been documented.”
Professor Schallreuter and her team made the discovery after studying an international group of more than 2,400 patients.
