It's official! Stress to blame for grey hair

Appearance of grey hair after periods of stress may result from depletion of stem cells from base of hair follicle

Stress really may turn your hair grey by depleting stem cells, a new study has claimed.

Researchers found the appearance of grey hair after periods of stress or skin damage could be the result of depletion of stem cells from the base of the hair follicle.

Hair and skin are both pigmented by melanin, produced by cells called melanocytes, which in turn are produced by melanocyte stem cells that live in a region at the very base of the hair follicle called the bulge.

Dr Mayumo Ito and colleagues from New York University found that when the skin is damaged or irradiated, these melanocyte stem cells help to repair skin damage by leaving the bulge and travelling to the skin to replenish the store of melanocytes in the outer layer of the skin.

However in the process, they leave the bulge without its own supply of melanocyte stem cells, ABC news reported.

The researchers discovered a key receptor involved with this stem cell migration, called Mc1r, which is triggered by stress hormones such as adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH) and melanin-stimulating hormone.

This may explain why stress is linked with an increase in grey hair, they said.

"Stress hormone (ACTH) promotes melanocyte migration from hair follicle to epidermis in mice and we thought it would be interesting to speculate that excessive stress might promote this migration too much at the expense of preserving melanocytes within the hair follicle," said Ito.

The discovery could also lead to treatments for conditions such as vitiligo - depigmentation of the skin - and to prevent hyperpigmentation, which is too much pigment in the skin, researchers believe.

"If we can know more about how melanocytes migrate from hair follicle area to the epidermis, we may get the ability to promote this process for the treatment of hypopigmentation disorders," said Ito.

"Our results suggest that melanocyte migration from the hair follicle to the epidermis may partly contribute to skin pigmentation, thus inhibition of this migration process may be a novel approach to prevent UV induced hyperpigmentation, or post-inflammatory hyperpigmentation commonly seen after surgery," Ito said.