Category Archives: L’Oreal

Angela Christiano, ISHRS, JAK Inhibitors, L'Oreal, Poietis

JAK Inhibitors and Alopecia Updates

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Hair loss news first:

— A day after I wrote this post, CNN covered JAK inhibitors in a new article. In a pleasant surprise, they also looked at the androgenetic alopecia (AGA) angle. Usually, all these articles on JAK inhibitors only look at alopecia areata (AA). Yet again, Dr. Angela Christiano says she is optimistic that JAKs could work on AGA patients (but only in a topical form). Dr. Brett King is not optimistic, but he is still testing it out in a lotion form on his AA patients who also have AGA.

In the above article, the one AA patient who they show with major hair regrowth after being on oral JAK inhibitors did not regrow the hair that he lost to AGA. Of course it is impossible to tell whether he did not regrow 100 percent of his male pattern hair loss or not. In any event, we will only know for sure about this once they test newer topical JAK inhibitors out so people should not get so emotional about this subject. You should also not try to test your own topical version as even the experts are having a hard time developing the appropriate version. According to Dr. Christiano:

“Though she thinks men might have the same success with an ointment, she said the trick is that it has to penetrate properly. Compared with the paper-thin skin of mice, human skin is “much thicker, and it’s oily, and it’s deep, and it’s got a fat layer — so there’s a lot to think about when making a good topical formula.”

— In a first, I missed covering the International Society of Hair Restoration Surgery (ISHRS)’s 24th Annual Congress that ran from September 28th through October 1st in Las Vegas. I did not even see any threads on the conference in any of the hair loss forums out there, which is strange. I usually cover the 2-3 most important hair loss related conferences in the world every year, but this time I forgot. You can find the detailed ISHRS 24th Congress final program guide here. As usual, there were way too many interesting presentations. For our purposes, the most important ones were:

  • Dr. Angela Christiano: “JAK Inhibitors, Hair Regeneration and Genetic Testing”.
  • Dr. Pantelis Rompolas: “Potency and Contribution of Stem Cells to Hair Follicle Regeneration”.
  • Dr. Rodney Sinclair: “Advancing our Understanding of the Biology of Androgenetic Alopecia and Changing the way we use Minoxidil to Treat it”.
  • Dr. Angela Christiano and Dr. Ken Washenik led a discussion titled “Biotechnology in Hair Regeneration”.

On Twitter, one doctor told me that while Dr. Christiano did not provide any data on JAK inhibitors for androgenetic alopecia (AGA), she did hint that JAK inhibitors stimulate the anagen phase of the hair growth cycle. Fingers crossed as usual when it comes to this subject.

I was surprised at the number of presentations on body hair transplants (BHT), with Dr. Arvind Poswal discussing long-term ten-year plus results of his BHT patients. Also surprising were the number of presentations on platelet-rich plasma (PRP).

— In stark contrast to the above omission, in the past week at least 10 (!) people either commented under a blog post or e-mailed me about cosmetics behemoth L’Oréal (France) and Poietis (France) partnering to bioprint hair follicles via laser. This news item was extremely well covered across the global media and there are hundreds of articles on the internet about this interesting subject matter. Also see my post on 3D bioprinting of hair follicles.

The end goal “holy grail” of this research will be to implant the new hair follicles into balding regions. Here is the official company video outlining the technology and the goals behind this partnership.

— Unfortunately, it seems like Replicel has not fulfilled the contractual obligations of its partnership with Shiseido (although the former disputes this allegation). In any event, it is unlikely that this will stop Shiseido from proceeding with its own plans.

— Kerastem completes enrollment in Phase 2 clinical trials.

— Former baseball great Jose Canseco just announced today that he will get a hair transplant with Dr. Parsa Mohebi next week.

— Sportscaster Joe Buck’s hair transplant addiction nearly cost him his voice and his career.

— The benefits of going bald. I would much rather have none of those benefits and keep my hair instead.

And now on to medical items of interest:

— The National Geographic is a highly reputable magazine so I believe them when they say that ending blindness is no longer just a dream.

— Rapamycin could make your dog (and maybe humans) live longer.

— Microsoft aims to cure cancer in ten years. After all, cancer is just a programming error.

— A very interesting new endeavor: “Human Cell Atlas project aims to map the human body’s 35 trillion cells“.

— Teeth regeneration advances.

— Building a bionic spine.

— 3D printing continues to revolutionize the field of prosthetic limbs.

— First “three person baby” born in Mexico (doctors went there from the USA in order to escape strict regulations). Baby’s parents were Jordanian. Medicine will hopefully soon become very multinational.

— Yet more evidence that turmeric is very good for you, but only when added to food that is then cooked.

— Endurance training causes positive genetic changes.

— Not sure if I believe half the stuff, but K. Comella’s presentation on “Reversing Aging with Stem Cells” from RAADfest 2017 seems very interesting. It includes a section on hair regrowth and has 100 percent thumbs up likes so far.

Angela Christiano, Breezula, Cellmid, Cosmo Pharmaceuticals, JAK Inhibitors, L'Oreal, Organovo, Rapunzel, Sergio Canavero

New Treatments for Thinning Hair in Women

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Although a lot of important developments have occurred in the hair loss world in the past several weeks, I have not been excited by most.

New Treatments for Hair Loss in Women

— A few days ago, the New York Times had a fairly detailed and interesting article on thinning hair in women. The article includes quotes from well known experts frequently mentioned on this blog such as Dr. Joseph Greco and Dr. Angelo Christiano. It seems like Dr. Christiano has helped start a company (called Rapunzel of course) where she will focus on hair multiplication via cell culturing.

I am not too excited about this as yet since clinical trials are 1-2 years away. In essence, this is yet another “cure is five years away” type venture. Even that timeline is optimistic based on the assumptions that she raises the requisite funds and that each stage of clinical trials progresses as planned. The one redeeming factor is that Dr. Christiano is very passionate about helping women with hair loss, perhaps largely because she also suffers from hair loss and wears a wig.

— The other interesting item from the above mentioned New York Times article was an explanation on why Latisse (Bimatoprost) will probably not work as well on the head as it does on eyelashes. According to the Cleveland Clinic’s Dr. Melissa Piliang, a well known hair loss researcher and dermatologist, Latisse works by shifting hair that is in a resting phase into hair that is in a growth phase. However, while 70 percent of eyelash hair is usually in resting phase, only 10-20 percent of scalp hair is usually in resting phase. I wonder if that 10-20 percent potential new hair growth is enough to make Bitamoprost at least as good as Minoxidil?

— Cellmid, a company that I discussed earlier this year, just announced very good results from an independently conducted trial of its FGF-5 inhibiting drug évolis ONE. I would be a lot more excited about this product if were not based on naturally occurring botanical extracts. And if there were more positive anecdotal forums posts from existing Australian users of the product. I just do not believe that any natural hair loss product can cause regrowth in bald areas of the scalp. In any case, their CEO Maria Halasz has Tweeted to me that the product will be in pharmacies in May.

— Italian company Cosmo Pharmaceuticals changed the name of its yet to be approved CB-03-01 topical anti-androgen product to Breezula per a March 25, 2015 detailed company presentation. Strange choice of name. The company also changed its own name to a more Italian sounding Cassiopea in April 2015.

— The two main stories in the hair loss world last year both involved JAK inhibitors reversing alopecia areata. The before and after photos in both cases (see bone marrow cancer drug Ruxolitinib and arthritis drug Tofacitinib) were mind blowing and took the global media by storm. This month, yet another JAK inhibitor (cancer drug Baricitinib) proved to have similar results, but the publicity surrounding this development was modest.

— Although related to the skin rather than to hair, cosmetics giant L’Oreal ‘s and 3D organ printing giant Organovo’s newly announced partnership in research is one to watch closely. The human skin is very closely related to hair, and L’Oreal has already made its presence felt in the hair world due to its much hyped yet to be released gray hair prevention pill.

— Finally, I was surprised that the crazy Dr. Sergio Canavero of the full body transplant (or “head transplant”, as has been falsely named by much of the media) fame has already found a patient. So they are likely to proceed with this insanity in 2016. Even crazier, it seems like Dr. Canavero got over 100 volunteers asking him to be the first person to get a new body. I cannot imagine that this will ever work. More on Valery Spiridonov. You can also read this interview with him and this one with Dr. Canavero.