What Happens TO AGING HAIR

Better healthcare and nutrition have enabled many more people to retain their physical vigor and relative youthfulness well into their silver years. When we compare middle age people with photographs of their grandparents taken at the same age, the most striking fact is how much older their grandparents looked. However, there is one aspect that has not improved significantly- hair, people’s crowning glory. Youth-conscious men still bemoan heir receding hairline and balding pate (male-pattern baldness) with advancing years and some women worry over increasingly sparse hair (female-pattern baldness).

Besides baldness, older people experience a number of other changes on their scalp.

1. HAIR COLOR

Gray hair is one of the most obvious sign of aging. It is due to decreasing levels of color pigment (melanin) produced by hair follicles. Hair becomes progressively lighter, eventually turning white due to absence of this pigment. Aging hair gets less UV protection due to decreased melanin.

What can cause the hair follicles to stop producing pigments? Pollution and exposure to UV radiation of the sun may trigger oxidative stress leading to damage to hair follicles.

In 2009, scientists in Europe described how hair follicles produce small amounts of hydrogen peroxide. This chemical builds on the hair shafts, which can lead to a gradual loss of hair color. (Wood, J.M et al. Senile hair graying: H2O2 mediated oxidative stress affect human hair color by blunting methionine sulfoxide repair. FASEB Journal

Some scientists speculated that there may be a ‘time clock’ that instruct melanocytes (melanin producing cells) to slow down production and eventually stop working as one ages. perhaps genes regulate the lifespan of each of these cells and they occur at different rates in individual hair follicles. That is why not all hair on the head turns gray at the same time.

2. HAIR THICKNESS CHANGE

By early 40s, the actual diameter of each strand of hair in people starts to shrink. Aging hair becomes finer due to shrinking size of hair follicles. The thickness of hair naturally becomes finer when the size of the opening for hair to emerge from its roots become smaller. Gradually, instead of producing terminal hair, affected hair follicles produce vellus hair, (the short, fine, fuzzy, colorless hair found on other parts of the body).

In women, Hair shaft diameter was more influenced by menopause. Postmenopausal women have finer and much less dense hair on the frontal scalp relative to pre-menopause.

3. DECREASED HAIR DENSITY

The rate of new hair growth slows and cannot replace the rate of natural shedding of hair from the scalp. Eventually many hair follicles stop producing new hairs altogether. The result is sparser hair or baldness in affected areas.

The number of active hair follicles may shrink 30 to 35 percent by age 60.

4. DULL, DRY HAIR

Einstein’s electrifying hair

Glossy or greasy hair of youth may turn into dull, dry hair in old age. This is because sebum [oil] production declines as people age.

After menopause, a woman’s scalp may be producing only half of what it did at its peak. Without the protection of sebum, the friction caused by hair rubbing against each other or from combing/brushing is more likely to lead to electrically charged static buildup. Unless you like the ‘Einstein look’, you will find that lack of lubrication from sebum makes hair feels rougher, looks duller, and is less manageable.

5. HAIR CURVATURE

Hair curvature change as one age, revealed a Japanese study. Besides higher curvature and less manageability, aged hair also is more vulnerable to damage (tiny kinks leave weak spots along the hair fiber). (Journal of structural biology, 10/2006)

NOTE: The study was conducted on Asian, not Caucasian women.

6. HAIR LIFESPAN

Hair goes through different phases in its lifespan. It has an active, growing phase, then stops growing and become dormant. The hair is shed at end of dormancy and a new phase with new hair growth begins.

With aging, there is a shorter active phase that produces fewer hairs, and these are smaller and of poorer quality than normal hair.

7. BIOCHEMICAL CHANGES

The hair produces substances that maintain its properties. A study in 2011 by two Japanese universities found levels of three molecules in hair altered with age. The finding was based on comparison of hair of subjects in their twenties to those in their fifties. The researchers propose these molecules can be possible markers for aging hair.

There are other chemicals produced by the body that trigger hair lost. However, they are not age specific, although more older people may get the condition.

As a result of the above changes, hair has less body, is less greasy, less smooth (which may be linked to curvature), weaker and less manageable. Generally, the hair aging process starts later in people with black hair.

The aging process of hair can be divided into two groups- intrinsic (internal) and extrinsic (external) factors*

Intrinsic factors:

•Genetic defects

•Hormones

•Age

•Body distribution (Where the hair is growing.)

Extrinsic factors:

•Climate

•Pollutants

•Toxins

•Chemical exposure

To a certain extent, hair damaged by both internal and external factors can be modified or improved through supplementation and lifestyle changes.

(Refer to articles from the TCM and Ayurveda perspective on factors that affect hair health and how to maintain the youthfulness of hair.)

* List of factors by Tom Dawson