Follica takes radical new approach to treating hair loss
May 29, 2009 by Julian Phillips
Filed under Company News, Follica, New Hair Growth Technologies
Follica, Inc., a small, privately-held Boston pharmaceutical company, is taking a radically new approach to treating hair loss — one that could revolutionize the new push to develop a cure for baldness.
Unlike recent efforts to reverse hair loss by stimulating or transplanting existing hair follicles, Follica is attempting something far more radical: It is attempting to actually stimulate the development of new hair follicles! The company has an exclusive, worldwide license from the University of Pennsylvania to use and commercialize a breakthrough technology for what they call follicle neogenesis. Dr. George Cotsarelis discovered that the physical disruption of the skin, under the appropriate circumstances, can actually lead to the creation of new follicles — and hence, new hair. According to the company’s literature, the capacity of the adult skin to generate new follicles has been observed since the 1950s and 1960s, but due to lack of understanding of the fundamental biology of the follicle, could never be definitively proven.
While other of the new hair loss companies have been struggling in recent months, Follica appears to be enduring — despite the recession and credit crunch. The company recently announced that William D. Ju, M.D. has been appointed as president and chief executive officer of the company, succeeding founding CEO Daphne Zohar, managing partner of PureTech Ventures. Dr. Ju will join existing Board members including Ms. Zohar, Mr. G. Kirk Raab, former CEO, Genentech, president and COO, Abbott and current chairman, Follica, Protalex, and Transcept, Dr. Kevin Bitterman, principal at Polaris Venture Partners, and Mr. Chris Ehrlich, general partner at InterWest Partners.
“We are thrilled to welcome Bill Ju as the CEO of Follica. He brings the ideal blend of dermatology and drug development experience, creativity and leadership skills to Follica in this next exciting phase of development,” Ms. Zohar stated.
The company explains the development of its new technology this way:
Using tools primarily developed in his lab, Dr. Cotsarelis was able to demonstrate hair follicle neogenesis and show enhanced effect through manipulating the key signaling pathways involved in hair follicle formation. Some of these pathways can be manipulated using known drug compounds. Follica is developing the hair follicle neogenesis platform into clinically effective therapies for treating hair loss and for long term or permanent hair removal. Additional pipeline products may apply in acne, skin rejuvenation, and wound healing.
Follica Takes in $11 Million for Hair Loss Treatment Approach
April 15, 2009 by Julian Phillips
Filed under Follica, Hair Cloning, Hair Growth, Hair Loss, Hair Loss Cures, Hair Rejuvenation, Stem Cell Treatments
Robert Buderi reports that leading stem cell baldness researchers at the new startup Follica have taken in $11 million in new funding — a sure sign that investors believe the new treatments will be viable. Burderi reports:
If only hair could grow as fast as Follica’s pot of money. Just seven months after its $5.5 million Series A financing round, the Boston-based startup today announced it has raised an additional $11 million to bolster its efforts to develop new methods of treating male- and female-pattern baldness and other hair-follicle disorders such as excessive hair growth and acne. Follica, which confirmed a human pilot study of its hair-regeneration technique is underway, also added several new team members, including veteran life sciences and biotech executive G. Kirk Raab, former CEO of Genentech, who joined the company’s board as chairman. Read more
Scientists develop gene therapy for baldness
February 19, 2009 by Julian Phillips
Filed under Follica, Gene therapy, George CotsarerlisScientists from the University of Pennsylvania say they may have overcome one of hair care’s biggest obstacles, by developing a means of creating new hair cells on the skin of mice. The research team said, in an article published in the journal Nature that in generating the new hair cells, it had defied previous belief that this feat was impossible.
Likewise, the research team also says that the technology could help in formulating skin care products for wound-healing, a secondary research channel to the baldness study.
The study found that, when the skin of mice is wounded, epidermal cells can respond by assuming the same properties as stem cells that generate hair follicles. This eventually led to the growth of new hair.
The team believes that this discovery could mean that older men with established hair loss could eventually be treated to restore their hair successfully.
The research team removed patches of skin from the mice and then studied the wounds as they healed during the course of several weeks.
During this process, cells not previously associated with hair follicles began to express genes found in stem cells that can give way to hair follicles as they develop.
The result was that in the samples, hair growth occurred regardless of the mouse’s age. Although it was also noted that there was no pigment in the hair follicles.
Further to this, the researchers found that the effect was boosted by using mice that had been genetically engineered to produce higher levels of proteins. These activate the genetic pathway underpinning the transformation of follicle stem cells.
The genetically engineered mice then went on to develop twice the density of hair follicles to that found in the untreated mice.
George Cotsarerlis, head of the research team, stated that he now wants to mimic this same process in human skin samples, envisaging a treatment similar to dermabrasion, combined with a topical cream to stimulate the proteins necessary to activate the genetic pathway.
“It’s all preliminary at the moment,” said Costsarelis. “If it all went perfectly then possibly in two to three years we would have a product, but that’s very optimistic.”
However, despite the relatively cautious outlook, the results of the study have given the team the confidence to form a company, Follica, which aims to spearhead bringing the treatment to market.
In parallel to the potential baldness cure, the research team is investigating new insights into skin functions, highlighting the powers of regeneration on the back of the skin wound healing process.
Currently there are a plethora of hair care solution that target baldness, including creams, lotions, shampoos, conditioners, as well as oral treatments like Finasteride and surgical treatments.
Originally posted here.
New Hair Loss Treatments: 9 Best Websites for Info on Hair Follicle Cloning
November 18, 2008 by Julian Phillips
Filed under Aderans Research Institute, Coen Gho, Follica, Hair Cloning, Hair Follicle Stem Cells, Hair Growth, Hair Loss, Hair Science Institute, Histogen, Intercytex, Luna Innovations, Phoenix Bio, Robert Bernstein, Shisheido ResearchThe science of hair follicle cloning — or stem cell treatments for hair loss — is evolving rapidly. Alas, we remain years away from a practical, real-world alternative to current hair transplant techniques, even sophisticated ones that replace hair follicle by follicle. The real goal for most people suffering from hair loss is some sort of hair cloning process… in which a person’s own hair is extracted, then multiplied in a laboratory, and replaced en mass in the area of loss. This is the dream… and it remains elusive.
But for all those researching this potentially revolutionary field, as a treatment or an investment, there are a few good places to start. Here is our Top 10 (Actually, Top 9) List of the best websites about hair follicle cloning or which follow it closely. In no order of rank, they are…
1. Aderans Research Institute: “dedicated to developing state-of-the-art cell engineering solutions for hair loss.”
2. Intercytex: It promotes “an autologous hair regeneration therapy, a suspension of human dermal papilla (DP) cells, for the treatment of male pattern baldness and female diffuse alopecia.”
3. Follica: “Developing novel therapies for conditions and disorders of the hair follicle, the epicenter for the development and replenishment of human hair and skin.”
4. Histogen: It is marketing “a proprietary liquid formula created by the culturing of newborn fibroblasts in an embryonic-like environment and then harvesting the naturally secreted growth factors, anitoxidants and other synergistic bioproducts that are produced” that, it claims, may have “significant applications” as “an injectable for hair growth.”
5. Luna Innovations: It is use “nanomedicine” to stimulate new hair growth.
6. Hair Science Institute: Dr. Coen Gho’s clinic that claims a superior method for individual follicle transplantation.
7. Phoenix Bio: A Japanese biotech company that “propagates hair papillar cells which are the key element in hair growth and develops therapies that enable the implantation of these cells on patients thus regenerating the ability of the patient’s scalp to produce hair naturally.”
8. Shisheido Research: Another Japanese company that is doing research into hair multiplication technologies.
9. Bernstein Medical Center for Hair Restoration: An advanced hair transplantation clinic, the Bernstein Center also follows closely developments in hair cloning technologies and is a good source for a
“hands on” reality check on what is realistic at the moment.Scientists May Have Discovered “Hair Loss Gene” and Hair Growth Stem Cell
October 14, 2008 by Julian Phillips
Filed under Aderans Research Institute, Dermal Papilla (DP) Cells, Follica, GlaxoSmithKline, Hair Follicle Stem Cells, Hair Growth, Hair Loss, Hair Regrowth, Hair Rejuvenation, Intercytex, Karolinska Institute, Lgr5 Protein, Stem Cell TreatmentsBloomberg News reports on two new studies that may have discovered the genes that put people at risk for hair loss and a stem cell that may actually grow hair.
The two studies — one on the genetic basis for hair loss, the other on hair follicle stem cells — were published recently in the journal Nature Genetics. Scientists from London-based GlaxoSmithKline Plc, the U.K. and Sweden worked together on the research.
“Early prediction before hair loss starts may lead to some interesting therapies that are more effective than treating late-stage hair loss,” said Tim Spector, a led researcher on the gene study who works at Kings College London’s department of twin research and genetic epidemiology, in a statement.
Spector and his colleagues analyzed the genes of 578 men in Switzerland with early-onset hair-loss, and compared them against those of 547 others who were retaining their hair. They then confirmed their findings against groups from the U.K., Iceland and the Netherlands, studying about 5,000 people in all. Those with hair loss commonly shared the same variations of two genes that together made them seven times more likely to suffer baldness, researchers from Kings College London and GlaxoSmithKline Plc wrote in the journal Nature Genetics.
The research associates the genes with hair loss, though further studies are needed to prove the connection. The genetic variations were also found in women, though the link wasn’t statistically significant and more research is needed, the authors said. The study was partly funded by Glaxo.
In the stem cell study, researchers led by Viljar Jaks of Sweden’s Karolinska Institute examined mouse hair follicles for signs of rapid growth. They found a protein, called Lgr5, on the surface of long-lived, active stem cells in hair cells; the same protein has been identified on stem cells in the intestine, they said in the study.
Cells bearing the Lgr5 marker were capable of maintaining hair follicles for as long as 14 months, the researchers said. In mouse studies, just a few of these cells were able to build an entire hair follicle, they said in the study.
The Swedish scientists identifying the Hair Follicle Stem Cells summarized their research in this way:
In mouse hair follicles, a group of quiescent cells in the bulge is believed to have stem cell activity. Lgr5, a marker of intestinal stem cells, is expressed in actively cycling cells in the bulge and secondary germ of telogen hair follicles and in the lower outer root sheath of anagen hair follicles. Here we show that Lgr5+ cells comprise an actively proliferating and multipotent stem cell population able to give rise to new hair follicles and maintain all cell lineages of the hair follicle over long periods of time. Lgr5+ progeny repopulate other stem cell compartments in the hair follicle, supporting the existence of a stem or progenitor cell hierarchy. By marking Lgr5+ cells during trafficking through the lower outer root sheath, we show that these cells retain stem cell properties and contribute to hair follicle growth during the next anagen. Expression analysis suggests involvement of autocrine Hedgehog signaling in maintaining the Lgr5+ stem cell population.
