MedClick

It begins with a few single strands at the temples and spreads from there. Yes, we all go grey eventually, usually from our 30's onward, but there are those whose hair begins to turn grey in their teens. What causes one's hair to turn grey? Does pressure and stress really accelerate the appearance of grey hair? Why do the roots remain their original colour?

Although hair is not a living organism and contains only dead cells it is tinted, as is our skin, by pigments called melanocytes. These are the cells which produce the pigment melanin in the hair root.

The melanin production process is carried out by enzymes; substances which act as process catalyst. In this case, the specific enzyme is called tyrosinase, which facilitates the breakdown of an amino acid called tyrosine, eventually producing melanin. This enzyme becomes less active over the years, thus less melanin is produced as we get older and the result is a "lack of pigment" or in other words - grey.

At the same time, degenerative processes also take place within the melanin-producing cells themselves. These are the melanocyte cells located in the hair root. As the years go by, the melanocytes become less active and they produce progressively less pigment, until they atrophy completely and disappear. Thus, through a combination of these two processes, the decrease in activity of the enzyme tyrosinase and the disappearance of the melanocyte cells, non-tinted hair grows. This initially appears among dark haired people as a shade of grey which combines the last vestiges of color with the non-tinted hair and eventually reaches the white hair typical of the elderly.

The greying process occurs initially in the head hair; however the process begins simultaneously in facial and body hair as well, in men and women alike. Incidentally, albinos have almost no melanin at all. Thus, they are born with white skin and hair. Nonetheless, it remains unclear why for most of us the melanin disappears from the hair but not from the skin.

When will you begin to turn grey? In most cases, it is around the age when your parents' first grey hairs appeared. Once the initial grey hairs appear it will be some ten years before your whole head goes grey. The greying process is a normal, expected physiological bodily process. Despite many attempts, no method has been found to arrest the disappearance of the pigments. And as opposed to the myth - no definitive evidence has been found thus far to demonstrate that mental stress causes our hair to turn grey.