The role of the hair follicle and its environment in androgenetic alopecia

我们的毛囊是我们中最接近永生的。这些是人体中唯一能在我们的一生中不断再生和退化的器官，自从我在组织工程和再生医学专业的第三年了解到它们以来，我一直对它们着迷。具有讽刺意味的是，在这一顿悟的几个月内，她将继续被诊断为雄激素性脱发（阿加）。这伊萨这些器官的疾病，给了我，非常字面上，真实的皮肤在游戏中。看到第一手的临床相关性，这一领域只会激励我更多地寻求在这个领域的学术生涯。脱发是一个数十亿美元的产业，但还没有药物，逆转，或治疗雄激素性脱发，也被称为模式脱发，或毛囊硬化。在现有的两种治疗方法中（仅对50%的患者有效），这两种方法都是偶然发现的--这些治疗方法只能延迟发病，不能逆转疾病。正如这种疾病的通俗名称所示--模式脱发--毛囊硬化只影响前额头皮上的特定区域毛囊。希金斯实验室拥有独特的机会获得来自额叶和枕叶头皮的匹配临床样本，研究这种模式的潜在机制。对于我的博士学位，我提出了三个独立但互补的工作流程，以便在其中一个被证明是徒劳的情况下重新冒险。每一个目标都有助于探索一种预防和逆转脱发的再生方法。

Our hair follicles are the closest to immortality any of us are likely to come. These are the only organs in the human body to continuously regenerate and degenerate throughout our lifetimes and I have been fascinated by them ever since I learned about them during the third year of my degreein the tissue engineering and regenerative medicinemodule. Ironically, within months of that epiphany, she would go on to be diagnosed with androgenic alopecia (AGA). This isa disorder of these very organs giving me, very literally, real skin in the game.Seeing first-hand the clinical relevance of this area only motivated me more to seek an academic career in this field.Hair loss is a multibillion-dollar industry yet there exists no drug, reversal, or cure for androgenetic alopecia, otherwise known as pattern baldness, or follicle miniaturisation. Of the two existing treatments available (which only work in 50% patients),both were serendipitous in their discovery -these treatments only delay onset and cannot reverse disease.As indicated by this disease's colloquial name-pattern baldness-follicle miniaturisation only affects specific regionalised follicles on the frontal scalp. The Higgins lab has unique access to matched clinical samples from the frontal and occipital scalp, investigate the mechanisms underlying this pattern. For my PhD, I propose three independent yet complementary workstreamsin order to re-risk my proposal should one prove futile. Each of these aims contribute to the same goal of exploring a regenerative approach to both prevent and reverse hair loss.