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Claudio Onorati / EPA
George Clooney rocks gray hair.
Exactly why hair turns gray remains one of life's little mysteries. But an important new discovery may help untangle the secrets behind the silvery strands.
Scientists may have found the root cause of what makes hair go gray. For the first time, researchers have identified the signaling protein that coordinates the process between hair follicle stem cells, which produce hair, and color-supplying stem cells, or melanocytes.
"We have shown that one specific molecular pathway is necessary in the regulation of melanocyte stem cells -- the Wnt pathway," says Mayumi Ito, PhD, an assistant professor of dermatology at the New York University Langone Medical Center in New York, and the study's lead researcher.
As Ito explains it, when the Wnt pathway is activated, melanocytes can produce pigments that color hair. When inactivate, melanocytes lose the ability to produce color, resulting in gray hair.
Ito's research, which is published in the journal Cell, looked at hair follicle stem cells and pigment-producing melanocytes in a mouse. But she said these findings are relevant for people because "mouse and human hair follicles are very similar in the way they function."
Knowing the Wnt pathway is important in regulating pigment-producing cells may "provide a new target for designing therapies for color loss and restoration," suggests Ito. So eventually this new understanding may be coming to a head of hair near you.
Slideshow: Celebrities who are silver foxes
But for many of us the news is too little, too late. Our tresses -- or what we still have left of them -- already have more gray hairs than we'd like. Although small comfort, we'll unlock some interesting facts about gray locks.
Age, gender, genetics, and ethnicity are the main factors affecting when you go gray, says Orr Barak, MD, a dermatologist at Tufts Medical Center in Boston. White men tend to go gray beginning in their mid-30s, while Asian men start graying in their late-30s, and African men in their mid-40s. Women typically start to gray five years later than men.
Stress probably contributes to this physical sign of aging, explains Barak, but there's not yet any science to support this claim. Asked whether you can go gray "overnight," he says there was one rare case reported four decades ago in a man in his 40s who developed alopecia areata, a sudden hair loss. He had salt-and-pepper hair, but because of this disorder only his regular colored hair fell out, so he was left all gray. Barak points out some other oddities:
- Hair on your scalp grays first; next comes facial hair and body hair is last. The longer a hair can grow, the sooner it might gray -- but cutting it has no influence on the process.
- Premature graying for whites may begin in their early 20s, for Asians in their mid-20s, and for Africans in their mid-30s. Some premature graying may be due to disease states, such as vitamin B-12 or niacin (B-3) deficiency, thyroid problems, or progeria (a genetic disorder that speeds up aging).
- Gray hairs are often first seen at the temples then gray spreads evenly back from there, with the crown of the head last.
- Your odds of going gray increase 10 to 20 percent every decade past 30.
- People who had radiation treatment to the scalp may find it stimulates their pigment-producing cells into action once again, and gray hair may grow back in its regular color.
At what age did you find your first gray hair?
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The FIRST time someone said "oh look, you have a gray strand", I was 17. I thought it was a one off. I didn't want to be a slave to the dye bottle (as my parents were), but here I am at 49 and I am fighting a losing battle. I see some women whose gray/silver/white hair is so awesome - the way it grows in. Unfortunately, I don't think mine is growing in nicely, so I end up with the bottle. I only color my hair brown, no fancy colors for me. I tried it once, the color looked great until the color hit my "silver/white" bits - they turned pink. I've always said that I will stop coloring when I'm 50, but as that is next year (and time flys) I might push it back to 60.
I also started getting gray hair very young, and dyed it dark brown until I turned 50. I was tired of the money spent and putting chemicals on my head.
It's impossible to tell how your hair looks gray (and how you will look with gray hair) until you actually see it, without any colored hair surrounding it. I let my roots grow until they were almost an inch long, and then had my hair cut as short as possible. Wonder of wonders -- my hair turned out beautiful, and I've never gone back to the bottle. I get compliments on the color nearly every day.
You have to do what feels most comfortable for you, but I'm here to say gray can be good -- and think of the time and money you'll save by not coloring.
I feel your pain ladies. I started to notice gray hair at 17. I was coloring by 26. I'm 50 now and am letting it go gray and loving it. Its really white! I was so tired of being held captive by that little bottle every 5-6 weeks and the expense.
You will know when the time is right to let it go - my 50th birthday was mine :)
I started getting grey hairs in high school, and now as 30-something, about 1/3 of the hairs of my head are grey. Oh well, I don't mind - yet. In another 10 years or so when the midlife crisis starts, I will break out the Just for Men gel.
I had my first gray hair at 16, and was 50% gray at 30 and 90% gray at 40, at 43, only have a few black hair left! Even worse, I've got a 4-5 white hair in my eyebrows, that usually only occurs when someone is in their mid 60s!.
I dislike gray hair so much because of my skin tone it washes me out completely. Some people with neutral or cool skin tone are fine with white hair.
The first shock of gray - at the temples, of course - showed up when I was 20 and working for my brother in law. My sister had an ulcer, so I didn't complain.
I'm 45 now and it's 90% white. I have always kept it short so dying was a real hassle. I used the bottle until it got to where the silver was the main color and quit dying about two years ago. I like it short and white - i just didn't like the muddy gray.
The only caveat is that if I start job hunting again I will probably go back to the color. My face is still young and, right or wrong, it could mean the difference between a job and not getting one.
Both my grandmother and her sister went gray early, but I've fortunately inherited Granddad's pretty white color.
My neighbor mentioned my grey hair to me when I was sixteen. Interestingly, he said to me, "You will never go bald." I am now 73, not bald and not completely grey.
As I think back on it, at the time he was 70, bald on the top, black hair on the sides and back and not one grey hair.
He told me somthing that day that I have always thought of as Tom's law, "If you start to turn grey at an early age you will never be bald. If you are going to get bald, you will not get any grey until after you are bald." I have watched over the years and found that it is generally true. So fellows, if you're getting up there with no grey, watch out.
My mom was fully grey at 19 and went straight to dying since it was a mousy grey. I found grey on me at 8 but that was only a little and my hair seems to change color on it's own, it was red at birth, so blonde there's a glare from it in photos of me at 3 and mostly brown by 12. Now at 40 it looks like all the colors, there's parts that look blonde, parts that look brown and a few areas that are red. My husband says I look like one of the X-Men.
I had the sporadic grey hair beginning in my teens. It never increased or decreased, but I think I may be proof of stress causing greyness. I had just the single hairs until my early 40s. Then, a new CIO was brought in at the company I worked at, back then. He upset a lot of stuff, made people worry about their jobs constantly, threatened departmental shake ups or demotions on a regular basis, or held back pay raises for IT staff when everyone else in the company was getting them. He created tremendous amounts of stress for eveyone in IT.
Within a year of his starting, I was almost totally grey. Add to this, the fact that no else in my family went completely grey as early as I did. Not even my younger sisters who have now reached that same age.
I'm 59 and have very few gray hairs. My husband also 59 has very dark hair but his beard and eye brows are salt & pepper. Everyone thinks we dye our hair and we don't. If u look close you can find some gray hair there. My grandmother at age 70 still had a lot of brown yet myMom, sisters and aunts and cousins went gray at normal ages. I don't know why I'm lucky with my hair but glad that I am because I know I would never keep up with dying it.
Speaking of dying it. I've always been happy with my brown and only used a rinse on it about 4 times. Always wondered if that was a factor as my sisters were always trying out different colors when they were young.
Same story here. My mother had fine hair but kept her color, especially in the back, well into her 70s, never did go all gray. I'll be 60 in a few months and have a little gray along my part, towards the crown. Two or three times a year now I bring it back to the color I had as a child, mostly because my hair looks dull (and me, tired) otherwise but I've gone 6 months+ with no color and people can't believe I haven't done anything to it. I always tell them it's "good genes, clean livin' and dumb luck" - not in that particular order. Very few wrinkles, either (thanks, Mom!)
On the other hand I have a couple of siblings who inherited the white blaze up front, in their late teens/early 20s. My youngest sister looks older than I do because she's the grayest of the lot of us (but takes after Dad's side of the family.)
I am 66 and have medium brown hair, you have to look really hard for my grey....I have no idea when my Mother went grey as she dyed her hair for as long as I could remember....my Son, at 48, has a lot of grey.....have six, younger half sisters and brothers (same Father) and all of them are either grey or balding (including my sisters). I won't become a slave to dying my hair either.....
My husband of is 69 and was balding when we met 37 years ago and started going grey in his late 30s....his Mother also had white hair in her 30s.
Grandmother died with dark hair at 92. She wasn't fooling anyone but that's how she liked it.
My naturally dark blonde hair started graying in my 40's, now in my early 50's it looks like light sun streaked blonde until I step out into full sun then it looks a lot more white. I love it! My father, who was a red head and is 86 still has enough red that people can still tell he was. My mother went completely white in her 50's. My husband went completely white in his late 30's, beard first.
I have several friends are my same age and do not color their hair and don't have any gray.
Yeah my beard is seriously salt-and-pepper but my hair is only very lightly sprinkled with grey. These articles always say the beard greys last but it's not that simple is it?
I started graying at 14. By 17, I was 90% gray. At 30 I quit covering it up. Interestingly, I moved to an agricultural area in the Midwest about 15 years ago, one that has LOTS of pollution not only because of agriculture but also because of shoddy oversight for decades, and my hair started turning dark again.
I quit drinking the water, or letting my pets drink it. My hair quit turning dark.
I call bs
My grandmother was completely gray at 16. All the women on my grandmother's side have gone gray prematurely. My hair was already turning gray at that age. I find that my daughters are graying even earlier - my 14 yr old has had gray for years, just one strand here or there. My THREE year old already has gray strands! It is interesting that this genetic factor has only hit the women on my maternal grandmother's side.
I am not even 40 yet, but I have given up on the whole hair dying thing. I tried for years, just under pressure from comments from family and friends. A few months ago I got a super short cut and let it go. It is salt and pepper now (more salt than pepper) and I love it. I get lots of comments and it is great.
I find the paragraph about disease factors interesting as well. I have discovered this last year that my own B12, and possibly thyroid levels have been almost non-existent, and have just barely begun treating these. It makes me wonder if this too, is a genetic factor from my grandmother or if it is just me. Health concerns have been almost lifelong. If they have been, does that plus the genetics give a good reason for the women in our family to be gray so early? It is something to think on AND investigate soon!
Great article. Really helpful. Will help me follow up some other leads that may help my girls down the road.
I am 58 and have no gray hair, yet my brother that is 4 years older was gray in his 20's.
63 and not one gray hair yet. Why is that?
Good clean living, Milly, for sure ;)
One of my grandmothers was completely white by her mid-20s, and my dad (her son) now has the same kind of white hair, although he didn't get it till his 60s. I found my first gray hair in my 20s, and I've been fighting the battle ever since (I'm 53 now). If I had inherited my grandma's beautiful white hair, I might have let it go, but I wasn't that lucky; my un-colored hair is an ugly iron-gray. So I refuse to let it grow out, and I continue to dye my hair a very pretty warm red color that suits my redhead complexion every six weeks. It's worth it to me.
My mother tells me she first noticed one or two white hairs when I was 3 years old. By the time I reached my early twenties I had a significant white streak in the front of my hair. That's when I started dying. At age 48 I decided that I just needed to be me - white hair and all. I went through a year full of bad hair days and short cuts trying to get all the color grown out. Now at age 51 I have a head full of white hair and I get complimented on it almost every day!
How about the fact that during studies on farm animals that when there was a lack of copper in the soil that sheep grazing on those pastures, their hair turned gray.
I believe this also has influence on our hair. It has also been proven that enhancing your diet and adding the daily recommended or proper amount of copper to your diet, which is very little will reverse the graying and color will be re-gained.
As someone who has read about this study and has also implemented more copper into my diet, I can say that this holds truth.
I have a large jar of pennies, better start munching on them...
I remember the Monday when I walked into the office and two office staff mentioned how much better I'd look if I dyed my hair. I looked back and said "When I am in a meeting with industry, the folks on the other side of the table--when they have hair--it is gray. I don't think a little gravitas on our side of the table hurts." They never mentioned it again.
Just like my Mother and Father, and all my 4 siblings, I've had gray hair since my early 20's, and started dying it when I was about 25 until 3 years ago, when I decided to be myself and let it all go gray. I'm now 50. Some people tell me that I'd look younger if I dyed it. I also receive many compliments on it, so it is what it is. I am who I am. And I'm going to stick to it! It's good to see more and more people accepting their gray hair, it's not the end of the world!
50 and gray, and I just get better looking every day.
I began going grey at 48 and now at 59 my hair is probably about 80% grey. However, my original hair color was an ash blonde and so the grey now just looks like highlights mixed in. I love being grey; I earned every strand, and unlike many who do not feel comfortable looking their natural age, I look upon my grey hair as a potent reminder that time is fleeting and waits for no man or woman, and that I'd get cracking and do what I hope to accomplish in my life before my personal timeline runs out.
It mixes well with your original hair and looks good on you. Could that be the reason you are embracing this aspect of aging? What if your hair was darker to begin with and the grey was dull, mousy and made you look tired and old? Spare us the lecture.
I'm 62 and have very few gray hairs. People think I dye my hair, just genetic my father did not go gray until his late 60s to early 70s.
I have had a few grey hairs due to a thyroid disorder since my mid-late twenties. I hate having to dye my hair every time my roots start to show, as having dark hair, it is VERY noticeable. They are all concentrated in the mid-top section so it would look odd if I let it grow out. If they can find some sort of permanent therapy to halt the growth and spread of greys, I would be very interested.
I'm 71 and not gray -- just a few stray hairs in my bangs. My hairdresser suggested that I might want to dye it silver since dark hair (nearly black) is harsh on an old face. I don't want the hassle. My vote goes with heredity. Neither my mother nor my grandmother had gray hair when they died.
What`s the theory about why hair falls on men & women?
I noticed a few grays in my teens, but started coloring my hair soon thereafter. By age 42, I could no longer hold color very well, especially around my face. Lots of premature silver/white on both sides of my family, so I decided to go for it and stop coloring and cut it very short. I am lucky that my hair is almost completely creamy white, but given my age (51) most people would call me blonde.
I noticed a few grays in my teens, but started coloring my hair soon thereafter. By age 42, I could no longer hold color very well, especially around my face. Lots of premature silver/white on both sides of my family, so I decided to go for it and stop coloring and cut it very short. I am lucky that my hair is almost completely creamy white, but given my age (51) most people would call me blonde.
I got my first gray hair when I was 14. My cousin, who is the same age as me, got her first gray hair at 14. We are the only two in our family that turned gray early. I have never dyed my hair and I never will. I get a lot of compliments on it, mostly from men!
I started dying my hair at 15 because I was getting some grays. But not for dying it, I am 100% gray! I was 100% starting about 24. At first it was cool because I could dye my hair all kinds of colors, now it is aggravating since I am all of 33 and have to color it about every 3 weeks!
It is funny what they said about the head hair goes grey first then the facial hair then the body hair. My beard has had grey in it since I was in my 30's but I am just starting to get gray on the head and I am 68 now. Must be in the genes. My mom did not get any gray hair until in her late 70's and when she passed away just before her 81st birthday had more brown than gray. My dad however was white headed when in his late 60 and was totally white headed when he passed away at 75. Guess I got my mom's hair.
Cotulla...as in Cotulla, Texas?
When I was 13, my mother pulled out 26 gray hairs and said "I'd better quit before I snatch you bald headed." I became prematurely gray, dyed it for 15 years, and then let it go natural. With my siblings (4 males, 1 female) we have all got premature gray hair. I also think it's interesting, at least in my family, we had one blonde, two browns, two blacks and a redhead; we're all gray but the ones with black hair for some reason are the whitest.