Melanocyte Stem Cells: A Melanocyte Reservoir in Hair Follicles for Hair and Skin Pigmentation

COL17A1 is crucial for preventing hair graying and loss by supporting hair and pigment stem cells.

This study demonstrates that stem cells from human foreskins, which lack hair follicles, can differentiate into melanocytes and migrate to the epidermis, potentially altering our understanding of pigmentation disorders.

This review explores how adult skin epithelia preserve stem cell populations for hair follicle regeneration and wound healing, but reports no new experimental results.

This article reviews follicular melanogenesis, detailing how melanin synthesis and its regulation in hair follicles depend on a complex interplay of cellular and molecular mechanisms, but reports no new clinical findings.

This study observed that melanogenesis in human hair follicles is linked to anagen phases, with melanocyte activity and enzyme expression being region-specific to the nascent bulb.

In this study, different types of catagen in the C57BL/6 mouse model exhibited varying effects on hair follicle melanocytes and melanin distribution, with spontaneous and dexamethasone-induced catagen showing pigment incontinence, while cyclophosphamide-induced catagen retained dendritic melanocytes but increased ectopic melanin.

This study found that the switch-off of melanogenesis during the hair cycle in C57 BL-6 mice is a gradual and stochastic process starting in mid anagen VI, with specific biochemical markers indicating the transition to catagen.