Gene therapy for inner ear hair

[Tricia]

I'm sure you've seen this news item. Wonder if it would work for scalp hair. Wish it would.

Gene therapy used to restore hearing
Scientists succeed with deaf animals

By Thomas H. Maugh II
Tribune Newspapers: Los Angeles Times
Published February 14, 2005


Michigan researchers have restored hearing in deaf mammals for the first time, a feat that represents a major step toward the treatment of the 27 million Americans with acquired hearing loss.

By inserting a corrective gene with a virus, the team induced the formation of new cochlear hair cells--the key intermediates in converting sound waves into electrical impulses--in the ears of artificially deafened adult guinea pigs.

They later demonstrated that the animals responded to sounds, according to the study published Monday in the journal Nature Medicine.

"A lot of the techniques would fairly easily translate into a clinical setting" for use in humans, said neuroscientist Matthew Kelley of the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders, who was not involved in the research.

Humans have about 16,000 hair cells in the cochlea of each ear, where they convert sound waves into nerve impulses. The cells are damaged easily by loud noises, aging infections and certain medications. Once damaged, they cannot regenerate on their own.

The key to the generation of new hair cells is a gene called Atoh1, discovered in fruit flies in 1998 by geneticist Huda Zoghbi of Baylor College of Medicine in Houston. During fetal development, the gene converts some cells in the ear into hair cells. In other ear cells, called supporting cells, its activity is suppressed.

Researchers showed that, working in laboratory dishes, the gene could convert supporting cells into hair cells.

Two years ago, Yehoash Raphael and Kohei Kawamoto of the University of Michigan Medical School reported that inserting the gene into supporting cells in guinea pigs produced thousands of new hair cells.

In those experiments, the researchers did not deafen the animals. This time they did, using chemicals to kill the hair cells in both ears of 10 guinea pigs.

They then used gene therapy with a viral vector to insert the Atoh1 gene into the guinea pigs' left ears. Within two months, new hair cells had appeared in the treated ears, but not in the untreated right ears.

To determine whether the new hair cells were functional, the team used tests of auditory brainstem response to measure the guinea pigs' ability to hear.

"The bottom line is, their hearing gets better, and that is a very big step," Kelley said.

[HairLossFight.com]

Tricia,

considering that tiny hairs are involved in hearing, I think that if they can use gene therapy to regenerate those then its probably not too far fetched to think the same can be done for scalp hair.... but I'm not a biologist so I just don't know.