Category Archives: Cellmid

Evolis Shampoo Enters China and the US

Update: December 20, 2021 — Evolis Professional just changed its name to Anagenics. Their popular hair loss shampoo currently has a 4 out of 5 stars rating on Amazon based on 190 reviews.

Evolis Shampoo
Evolis Shampoo.

I have covered Australia based Cellmid (now Anagenics) and its Evolis line of plant based hair loss products a number of times in the past. However, I usually limited my discussion of Cellmid to a small part of my once-a-month “brief items” posts.

There are many other companies that are of far more interest to those of us who are looking for a permanent hair loss cure. Note that in 2023, Marie Claire listed Evolis Professional Promote as one its 25 best shampoos.

Évolis, Cellmid and FGF5 Inhibition

I do not consider the Cellmid’s fibroblast growth factor 5 (FGF-5) based Évolis™ line of natural hair growth products to be any kind of a miracle hair loss treatment. However, it is not out of the question that Évolis products can at least modestly benefit your hair.

There is quite a bit of scientific evidence in regards to the inverse connection between the FGF5 protein and scalp hair growth and length. Perhaps the most well known paper on this subject is one that was co-authored by Dr Claire Higgins and Dr. Angela Christiano in 2014: “FGF5 is a crucial regulator of hair length in humans“.

FGF5 causes hair to stop growing. In the absence of FGF5, people can grow excessively long hair. Cellmid CEO Maria Halasz has quite an interesting story to tell in regards to the start of her company and product. Some years ago, while on a trip to Japan, she accidentally discovered that certain natural ingredients inhibited FGF5 and promoted hair growth in the process. Hence was born Évolis.

Evolis Ingredients
Evolis Shampoo Ingredients.

I found the above primarily natural ingredient list on one of Évolis’ product packaging inserts.

Evolis Enters China and the US in 2018

  • In May 2018, it was announced that Cellmid was entering into a distribution deal in China with Beijing Fukangren Bio-PharmTech. The latter will distribute the former’s Évolis anti-aging and hair care products in China.
  • In July 2018, Cellmid entered into a sales agreement with US based department stores Neiman Marcus and Bloomingdales. These chains will start selling the company’s hair loss products in September 2018.

Interesting, only one person currently seems to be selling Evolis on Amazon. In contrast, numerous third party vendors are selling Shiseido’s Adenosine based Japanese products.

Note that Maria Halasz purchased $7.5 million worth of Cellmid stock at the end of 2017.

Dr. Manabu Ohyama and other Hair News

Dr. Manabu Ohyama

I covered Dr. Manabu Ohyama on this blog before. This week he published an important study that could help advance research into overcoming the difficulties associated with the preparation of trichogenic human dermal papilla cells (and, as a result, help in the bioengineering of hair follicles). The study is too technical for me to understand without devoting many hours of time. However, I found it quite interesting that in the report, they devote a large section to Minoxidil. Interesting quote regarding how Minoxidil works:

“Minoxidil is a clinically used hair growth promoter that enhances hair KC (keratinocyte) proliferation and activates hDP cells to induce growth factors. IGF-1 is among these growth factors, and has been shown to exhibit a potent hair elongation effect.”

Replicel

I have covered Canada based Replicel (and its Japanese partner Shiseido) dozens of times on this blog before. They just released 5-year safety data for “a high-dose of dermal sheath cup cells (DSCC) for patients with pattern baldness due to androgenetic alopecia”, which is basically their RCH-01 product. Since the injected cells are a patient’s own cells (i.e., autologous), the positive safety results are not surprising. In regards to efficacy (on a small sample size of 19 test patients –> 10 male and 9 female): “an overall stabilization of hair loss was observed among all the patients treated per protocol”. The best 10 respondents witnessed a sustained 4.2 percent increase over baseline hair density at 24 months after injection. Will be interesting to see their 5-year post injection efficacy results, since current data only covered 2 years post injection results.

The scientists involved theorize that rather than one large dose, many small doses spread over some time period will result in even superior outcomes. Results will also improve as they learn more about optimum depth of injections, make use of their new proprietary injection device, and conduct gene expression analysis. FYI — I am much more interested in Shiseido than in Replicel, but unfortunately the former makes very few new announcements.

Cellmid

I have covered Australian company Cellmid a few times on this blog before, usually very briefly since I am a skeptic about any purported benefits of their hair growth product beyond modest regrowth at best. However, today I read that the company’s CEO Maria Halasz purchased 400,000 shares of Cellmid (at a cost of $11,200) and now holds a total of 27.3 million shares. I assume she really believes in their hair loss product, which inhibits fibroblast growth factor-5 = FGF-5. Or she believes that she will be able to sell her stake at a higher price irrespective of how well the product ends up doing. The company has made several important announcements on Twitter recently, and saw phenomenal sales growth in the last quarter of 2016.

Interesting new video from hair transplant surgeon Dr. John Cole. in which he cover hair follicel stem cells.

James Nesbitt and his hair transplants.

And now on to medical items of interest:

Terminal cancer remission in 1/3 of patients after new gene therapy treatment.

New blood test for early cancer detection.

Cambridge scientists create first self-developing embryo from stem-cells. In mice.

3D printed fully functional blood vessel network created via using an ultra-fast bioprinting system.

Interesting stem cell work from Japan via RIKEN.

Editas, Allergan and gene editing for eye diseases.

— Update on DIY biohacking.