Cure for baldness 10 years away, scientist says

Take heart, Bruce Willis, Michael Bolton and William Shatner. There may be hope for you yet.

A University of B.C. researcher -- in fact, one of the few people in the world to actually hold a doctoral degree in hair biology -- says a cure for baldness could be in the offing within 10 years.

Kevin McElwee, who flew to Berlin Thursday to present his research to an international Meeting of Hair Research Societies, says the secret could lie in a new technique called "hair cloning."

McElwee, speaking in the University of B.C. public affairs magazine, UBC Reports, says hair cloning is a slang term for engineered hair growth.

At the base of each hair follicle -- the living part of the hair rooted in the skin -- is a group of cells. McElwee says that if these follicular cells were isolated and multiplied in a laboratory, it would then be possible to re-implant them into the donor's scalp where, ideally, they would divide to create new follicles and generate new hair.

If his theory works, a sample of only about 10 hairs could produce several million cultured cells which, in turn, could grow several thousand strands of hair.

It also could mean a new lease on life for over half of all men over the age of 50 who suffer some degree of baldness. About 20 per cent of all women also suffer from varying degrees of hair loss.

Scientists have been studying hair cloning in animal models for a number of years, but McElwee is the first investigator to demonstrate exactly how it works.

"Now that we have proof of how this process works, we can accelerate the research toward creating a limitless supply of hair -- in effect, a cure for baldness," said the 34-year-old McElwee.

While early results in the laboratory have been promising, he said it likely will take another 10 years of study, clinical trials and regulatory testing before cloning is available to the general population.

McElwee, who was a senior scientist at Philipp University in Germany before joining Vancouver's Coastal Health Research Institute, did a PhD in alopecia areata, an inflammatory hair loss disease that can affect men, women and children, and can even cause full body hair loss.

The cause of the disease is not fully understood, but it is believed that an individual's own immune system may prevent hair follicles from producing hair fibres.

His colleague, Jerry Shapiro, said McElwee's research extends beyond a cure for baldness and is especially important to those who suffer from alopecia areata. "People can lose their hair very quickly -- within months and sometimes even weeks. It's psychologically devastating," he said.

"If we can unlock the mysteries of alopecia areata, we can unlock the mysteries of other auto-immune diseases like lupus or multiple sclerosis. It can also help us to understand the mechanism of wound healing," said Shapiro, director of the UBC hair research and treatment centre.

"Give us around 10 years, and we'll answer many questions," he said.

According to research by the Canadian Hair Research Foundation in 2000, hair loss can even affect a person's ability to find work. The study found that when applying for jobs, 41 per cent of men with full heads of hair were selected for job interviews while only 27 per cent of balding men were selected.

In addition, 60 per cent of Canadian women say they prefer men with hair, and one in four Canadians believe it is harder for a balding man to find a sexual partner than it is for a man with a full head of hair.