Printed skin with follicles

[macbeth81]

Follica's patent states the use of hydrogel following dermabrasion. The Phase IIa data appears to be the result of only using hydrogel. It clearly was not enough.

With regard to Follica: Their CEO left last year, Cotsarelis stated to Desmond84 that they needed more money, and as far as we know, Follica did not receive any of the recent money raised by PureTech. Putting it all together they most likely have nothing.

https://drive.google.com/viewerng/viewer?url=patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/pdfs/US20140079686.pdf

[DepressedByHairLoss]

could it really be that easy? a miracle hydrogel to promote healing and force the cells to create all necessary blood vessels, hair follicles etc.
if so, then we really need that, and to give it a try with some serious wounding.
so many facts and articeles point directly into the wounding mechanism. we have to investigate more on this.

It really needs to be investigated, especially since it contains no drugs or biological components and could therefore bypass rigorous FDA trials. But unfortunately most of these "researchers" seems to only be concerned with fiddling around with lab mice.

I'd love to hear Desmond's opinion on this hydrogel; I trust him more than any of these "researchers".

[Desmond84]

Hi guys.. Finally got around to reading this thread.. It's all very interesting.. I had read about the 78 year old man but never had seen the photos.. It is quite amazing. Did he grow hairs on his temples!This is unheard of.

From what I know when your body undergoes serious trauma, an entire cascade of chemicals, enzymes and proteins are produced to ensure optimal repair that lead tothis kind of phenomenon which we don't fully undrestand.

Another example apart from this burn victim is patients suffering from skeletal fractures. For many years now, the medical community has been aware of the phenomenon whereby patients that suffer from a fracture, generally tend to get very thick terminal hairs growing in the fracture area and it is almost always visible upon cast removal. Some of the signals involved we know and some we don't.

Doing further research on these signals may prove to be the holy grail of hair regeneration. Trouble is finding sufficient grants to conduct this type of research and unfortunately there's not much money going around. I hear some of the guys from *** have put together a Hair foundation to increase awareness and collect funding to allocate money to finding a cure.. That is the best idea ever and I'll be gladly donating to such an organisation.

As for the printing skin with hair follicles, I know that Dr Lauster's team is working on a similar method albeit they are not printing it but growing the skin components around their mini hair follicles. One thing that I never got to mention before was Dr Lindner briefly mentioned at Hair congress that they are aware of a very similar project being undertaken by DARPA in the US and they may be on par or even further ahead than the German team. DARPA is also using the microchip technology to grow skin and hair follicles.

Let's hope we hear from either team soon

[Desmond84]

I actually tried to dig up some information about the work being undertaken by DARPA but it all seems to be top secret and behind closed doors.. May be some of you guys with god-tier IT skills can shed some light on this lol

[Desmond84]

Double post please deletd

[Desmond84]

It really needs to be investigated, especially since it contains no drugs or biological components and could therefore bypass rigorous FDA trials. But unfortunately most of these "researchers" seems to only be concerned with fiddling around with lab mice.

I'd love to hear Desmond's opinion on this hydrogel; I trust him more than any of these "researchers".

Lol thanks for the vote of confidence. Tbh, we use hydrogel all the time on first and second degree burns with very good results in terms of skin healing and scar prevention. But I can't imagine how it would help regrow hair..

Hydrogel is merely water trapped in Xanthan gum. It creates a moist environment for skin to heal itself and contains no active ingredients. Considering fin and dut fail at regrowing long lost hair I doubt a water based moisturiser would have such extraordinary results. Having said that it is harmless and also helps healing which is useful in terms of application after dermarolling.. Hope that helps

[mikes23]

The cure is lab grown follicles imo. Now histogen and replicel maybe a cure for people in early stages of hairloss, but lab follicles will be a cure for everyone. Everybody is working with 3d printing now and orgavano use 3d printed livers in people now. So i would assume fda trials would not be that demanding on 3d printed follicles since we already have 3d printed organs out and being used. I believe russia plans on using 3d printed kidneys in 2018. But I don't know alot about the fda clinical trials so my assumption may be wrong.
BTW Desmond have you heard anything from dr lauster yet. Seeing how we solved some major aspects like the dp cell inductivity and the problem with ips cells, do you have any guess of how close dr lauster is to solving this problem?

[hellouser]

Lol thanks for the vote of confidence. Tbh, we use hydrogel all the time on first and second degree burns with very good results in terms of skin healing and scar prevention. But I can't imagine how it would help regrow hair..

Hydrogel is merely water trapped in Xanthan gum. It creates a moist environment for skin to heal itself and contains no active ingredients. Considering fin and dut fail at regrowing long lost hair I doubt a water based moisturiser would have such extraordinary results. Having said that it is harmless and also helps healing which is useful in terms of application after dermarolling.. Hope that helps

Welcome back dude

[noisette]

I actually tried to dig up some information about the work being undertaken by DARPA but it all seems to be top secret and behind closed doors.. May be some of you guys with god-tier IT skills can shed some light on this lol

What do you think about this project ? It could help for battling hairloss... This project called ElectRx, by DARPA

http://www.forbes.com/sites/federicoguerrini/2014/08/29/darpas-electrx-project-self-healing-bodies-through-targeted-stimulation-of-the-nerves/

[joachim]

what, darpa is working on creating skin and follicles with bio microchip technology?
i guess this can only have military purposes for soldiers, burn victims etc.
i don't think we can really assume they are working on curing hairloss.

but i would really love to hear an update on lausters team. i have a feeling they are still 20 years away from the first grown hair in humans.

[Julius Caesar was bald]

All this talk of wounding....I have a sore on my scalp that hasn't gone away for some years. The dermatologist told me if I stop picking it will go away, but I guess I have some sort of anxiety disorder. Anyway the spot is on the back of my head where I can't see with a mirror. After several years I got a smart phone and decided to take a picture. The spot is in bald territory, but the hair is thicker right on that sore than any of the area around it.

[joachim]

All this talk of wounding....I have a sore on my scalp that hasn't gone away for some years. The dermatologist told me if I stop picking it will go away, but I guess I have some sort of anxiety disorder. Anyway the spot is on the back of my head where I can't see with a mirror. After several years I got a smart phone and decided to take a picture. The spot is in bald territory, but the hair is thicker right on that sore than any of the area around it.

i know a lot of similar cases... even in my personal circle of friends.
it's definitely true that wounding causes new skin cells to form new hair follicles. like cotsarelis described, there is time window where this decision for the cells takes place. because of such known cases where people grow new hairs out of wounds, sores, and even pimples, the approach of dr. cotsarelis seemed so promising and real. then they even stated they are able to create consistently new hairs. they even have patents for laser wounding devices. but surprisingly, dr. cotsarelis mentioned on the last hair congress to desmond that there is no cure in sight, not within the next 10 years. it's unbelievable. something really fishy is going on here.

[hellouser]

i know a lot of similar cases... even in my personal circle of friends.
it's definitely true that wounding causes new skin cells to form new hair follicles. like cotsarelis described, there is time window where this decision for the cells takes place. because of such known cases where people grow new hairs out of wounds, sores, and even pimples, the approach of dr. cotsarelis seemed so promising and real. then they even stated they are able to create consistently new hairs. they even have patents for laser wounding devices. but surprisingly, dr. cotsarelis mentioned on the last hair congress to desmond that there is no cure in sight, not within the next 10 years. it's unbelievable. something really fishy is going on here.

I think the time window is AFTER a scab is removed from the wound area. If you read the patents on Cotsarelis' FGF-9 studies, you'll notice this:

FIG. 1. FGF9 is expressed during inductive period of hair follicle regeneration at Day 1 after scab detachment (SD). The ratio of FGF9 mRNA compared to control mRNA expression q-PCR of FGF9 mRNA expression in regenerated epidermis is presented.

Example 1 FGF9 Expressed in Early Period Of Hair Germ Formation

FGF9 mRNA expression was evaluated in regenerated epidermis by quantitative real time-PCR. FGF9 was expressed at higher levels prior to the earliest stages of hair follicle regeneration at Day 1 after scab detachment (SD; which occurs at reepithelialization) compared to Day 5 after scab detachment when follicles have formed (FIG. 1). Skin γδT-cells (detected by immunostaining using antibodies against γδTCreceptor) repopulate the reepithelialized epidermis by SD7 (FIG. 2, left panel) and these cells express FGF9 protein at SD1 (red dendritic cell in epidermis, FIG. 2, right panel, and FIG. 3).

Thus, FGF9 was selectively expressed prior to hair germ formation (during the undifferentiated period) rather than during differentiation. Skin γδT cells appeared to be the source of FGF9, which suggests inflammatory cells may have a role in Wound-induced hair follicle neogenesis (WIHN).
Example 2 FGF9 Expressed in Embryonic Day 14 (E14) Skin

FGF9 (red staining) is expressed by γδTC (green staining) in embryonic day 14 (E14) skin (FIG. 4).
Example 3 FGF9 Plays a Role in Wound-Induced Hair Follicle Neogenesis (WIHN) Anti-FGF9 Neutralization Experiment in Adult Mice

Fgf9 expression significantly increases after wounding prior to hair follicle neogenesis: To define molecular events responsible for hair follicle neogenesis following wounding, we compared gene expression in wounded epidermis soon after reepithelialization (1 and 3 days after scab detachment “SD”) to the initiation of hair follicle neogenesis (SD5). Microarray analyses showed that Fibroblast growth factor 9 (Fgf9) was significantly upregulated (4.2 fold) prior to hair follicle germ formation. We further analyzed Fgf9 gene expression changes in reepithelialized epidermis around the time of hair follicle neogenesis by quantitative RTPCR (FIG. 16A). Fgf9 gene expression increased significantly after reepithelialization until to the initial stages of hair follicle neogenesis when expression decreased dramatically. These results show that Fgf9 is upregulated in the newly formed epidermis just prior to hair follicle neogenesis presumably at a time when cells are committing to the hair follicle lineage.

Inhibition of Fgf9 decreases hair follicle neogenesis. Fgf9 is a secreted ligand with a known role in lung, kidney and gonad development, but it has not been previously implicated in hair follicle development or regeneration. Nevertheless, the main receptor for Fgf9 in the skin, Fgr3b, is expressed in epidermis and is upregulated in regenerated skin after wounding. To address the importance of Fgf9 in hair follicle neogenesis following wounding, we injected Fgf9 neutralizing antibody into the reepithelialized skin daily for four days (FIG. 16 b, Table 2). Wounds treated with anti-Fgf9 antibody showed a significant reduction of new hair follicle formation when compared with controls. The hair follicles that did form in anti-Fgf9-treated wounds were in immature stages of development (FIG. 19).

Forced overexpression of Fgf9 in the new epidermis increases hair follicle formation. Since blocking Fgf9 inhibited hair follicle neogenesis, we asked whether increasing levels of Fgf9 in the wound would promote hair follicle neogenesis following wounding. We used a doxycycline-inducible transgenic mouse (K14rtTAx TRE-Fgf9-IRES-eGfp) to inducibly target Fgf9 expression to the epidermis following wound re-epithelialization. Administration of doxcycline from SD1 to SD4 increased Fgf9 expression 150-fold (FIG. 20) compared to doxycycline treated control mice. This targeted overexpression of Fgf9 to the epidermis for four days after reepithelialization led to a marked increase in the number of hair follicles compared to controls (FIG. 16 c, Table2).

Source:

https://www.google.ca/patents/US20110282267

So... somethings gotta be done from the day of the wound until a few days after the scab is detached. We just need to find the proper agents to do this.

[David7]

We stay bald = More money for Rogaine, Minoxidil, Finasteride... etc , we need something like the ice bucket challange for baldness.

[noisette]

We stay bald = More money for Rogaine, Minoxidil, Finasteride... etc , we need something like the ice bucket challange for baldness.

we stay bald = hope for an biology startup to have a cure = billion dollars and a cure for us