Hair Follicle Stem Cells Regenerate Nerves

Reason of the LongevityMeme reports on progress made in stem cell technology with the use of hair follicles.

Hair follicles turn out to be quite potent in their abilities, which is a good thing. It may turn out we won't be needing any embryonic stem cells at all, which is another controversy wiped off the table. This can only speed up stem cell research.

A quote from the site:

(Via Genetic Engineering News). Scientists discovered a population of multipotent stem cells in adult hair follicles back in 2004, and now these cells are bring put to work in regenerative medicine: researchers "have found that stem cells from hair follicles of mice can be used to rejoin severed nerves in mouse models. Easily accessible hair follicle stem cells, which normally function to form the hair follicle which in turn form the growing hair in all mammals including man, have been shown to have great potential to produce nerve cells and many other types of cells. The hair follicle stem cells were used by the AntiCancer researchers to rejoin nerves in the legs of mice that were experimentally severed. After injection of the hair follicle stem cells, the nerves were rejoined and were able to regain function, enabling the mice to walk normally again."

The original article can be found here.

For more info on what's going on in hair-related science, look here.