Decoding “Grey hair” VS “Stress”
“Grey hair” is one of the most disturbing issues for many people. As it can lead to low self-esteem and confidence, and cause an impact on the socio-cultural spheres. One of the factors that has been blamed for grey hair is “Stress”. But did you know that the interaction between the stress and premature greying is still a mystery that the scientists have been trying to find out?
Naturally, our hair color begins to turn grey because of age. This is our body’s natural transformation process. Theoretically melanocyte which is specialized cell that produces melanin pigments responsible for skin, eye, and hair pigmentation, is the key factor. Due to aging, the ability to protect cells from damage caused by free radical will be decreased unavoidably. This causes the melanocyte gradually disappear, affecting the greying of hair. What if we early get grey hair at the age of thirty (premature greying of hair)? Is stress one of its causes?
Besides smoking, exposure to air pollution or malnutrition, the stress is known to be a trigger for sudden greying of hair. For example, Marie Antoinette syndrome, the unhappy Queen Marie Antoinette of France, whose hair allegedly turned white the night before her last walk to the guillotine during the French Revolution. However, there is no definitive explanation on how stress affects the sudden greying of hair.
Recently, researchers have uncovered a correlation between "stress" and the mechanism of pigmentation. The experiments were conducted on young mice having black hair. After passing only a few weeks, it was found that dark-furred mice turned completely white.
Scientifically, this was due to the emotions of pain or fear. Adrenaline and cortisol hormones were released that caused heart rate and blood pressure increased. This condition affected the nervous system that led to severe stress and finally destruction Melanocyte stem cells responsible for hair pigmentation.
In addition, the researchers also compared the genes of stressed mice with the normal ones. It was found that in the stressed mice, a type of protein was produced that caused the melanocyte stem cells damaged. However, if the stressed mice were given a drug that inhibited this protein, it helped slow down the hair discoloration.
This above mentioned is a multi-year research by researchers from Harvard University, United States in coordination with the University of Sao Paulo, Brazil, published in a journal named “Nature”, aiming to uncover the secrets of the correlation between stress and greying of hair. Although this latest discovery is just an animal experiment, the researchers strongly believe that it could benefit the development or improvement of new medicines or figuring out of method to prevent and slow down premature greying of hair caused by stress.
