Hair Graying Regulators Beyond Hair Follicle

Jing Chen; Yixin Zheng; Chen Hu; Xuexiao Jin; Xiaoping Chen; Ying Xiao; Chaochen Wang

doi:10.3389/fphys.2022.839859

Hair Graying Regulators Beyond Hair Follicle

Front Physiol. 2022 Feb 24:13:839859. doi: 10.3389/fphys.2022.839859. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Jing Chen^{1

2}, Yixin Zheng², Chen Hu³, Xuexiao Jin⁴, Xiaoping Chen⁴, Ying Xiao⁵, Chaochen Wang^{1

2}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Breast Surgery, The Second Affiliated Hospital, Zhejiang University School of Medicine, Hangzhou, China.
² Zhejiang University - University of Edinburgh Institute, Zhejiang University, Haining, China.
³ School of Medicine, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China.
⁴ Institute of Immunology and Department of Rheumatology, Sir Run Run Shaw Hospital, Zhejiang University School of Medicine, Hangzhou, China.
⁵ Central Lab of Biomedical Research Center, Sir Run Run Shaw Hospital, Zhejiang University School of Medicine, Hangzhou, China.

Abstract

Hair graying is an interesting physiological alteration associated with aging and certain diseases. The occurrence is due to depigmentation of the hair caused by depletion and dysfunction of melanocyte stem cells (MeSCs). However, what causes the depletion and dysfunction of MeSCs remains unclear. MeSCs reside in the hair follicle bulge which provides the appropriate niche for the homeostasis of various stem cells within hair follicle including MeSCs. In addition to local signaling from the cells composed of hair follicle, emerging evidences have shown that nerves, adipocytes and immune cells outside of hair follicle per se also play important roles in the regulation of MeSCs. Here, we review the recent studies on different cells in the MeSCs microenvironment beyond the hair follicle per se, discuss their function in regulating hair graying and potentially novel treatments of hair graying.

Keywords: adipocytes; hair graying; immune cells; melanocyte stem cells; nerves.