Smoking accelerates men's hair loss/ Could antidepressants lengthen your life?

November 23, 2007

http://www.stuff.co.nz/4281555a19716.html

Smoking accelerates men's hair lossReuters | Tuesday, 20 November 2007

Fairfax Media

CONE-HEADS: A new study has shown a link between smoking and male pattern baldness.

While Asian men generally have less trouble than Caucasians with the most common form of hereditary male baldness, smoking cigarettes may erase that edge, researchers have said.

Smoking may destroy hair follicles, interfere with the way blood and hormones are circulated in the scalp or increase the production of estrogen, said Lin-Hui Su of the Far Eastern Memorial Hospital and Tony Hsiu-Hsi Chen of National Taiwan University in Taipei.

A look at 740 men in Taiwan with an average age of 65 found cigarette use played an important role "in the development of moderate or severe" hair loss, Su and Chin said, in cases where the men smoked 20 or more cigarettes a day.

But generally speaking the risk of androgenic alopecia – the common male hair loss that occurs in various patterns – was slower among the Taiwanese men than among "persons of white race/ethnicity" as measured by previous studies elsewhere.

The study, published in the November issue of the Archives of Dermatology, recommended that men showing early signs of hair loss should be advised about the role smoking can play to prevent further progression.

While the kind of hair loss studied is common among whites, it is less common among blacks, Asians and native Americans, the study said. Three previous studies on the impact of smoking produced inconsistent results, it added.

-------------------------

Could antidepressants lengthen your life?

Reuters | Thursday, 22 November 2007

http://www.stuff.co.nz/4284281a19716.html

An antidepressant may help worms live longer by tricking the brain into thinking the body is starving, US researchers say.

The drug, called mianserin, extended the life span of the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans by about 30 per cent, the researchers reported in the journal Nature. They hope to find out if the same mechanism can help people live longer.

Three other compounds, including another antidepressant, have similar effects, said Michael Petrascheck of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Centre in Seattle. But the life-extending benefits come at a cost.

"Weight gain and increased appetite seems to be one of the side effects. It is one of the reasons these are not such popular antidepressants," Petrascheck said in a telephone interview.

Many studies have shown that slightly starving certain animals – reducing how much they eat by about 30 per cent – can cause them to live longer.

It is not entirely clear if this occurs in humans, but researchers are keen to duplicate the beneficial effects of calorie restriction without the misery of going hungry.

Howard Hughes Medical Institute researcher Linda Buck and colleagues were looking for drugs that might do this.

C. elegans is a roundworm, or nematode, much studied because despite its tiny size, its biology is similar to that of humans and other animals.

Buck's team did a random search through 88,000 different drug compounds to see if any of them happened to make C. elegans live longer.

They found four drugs that extended life span by 20 per cent to 30 per cent. The drug with the strongest effect was mianserin, in a class of drugs known as tetracyclic antidepressants.

It blocks brain cell signalling by the neurotransmitter or message-carrying chemical serotonin, which is linked with mood and appetite.

The drug is used in Europe under several brand names, including Bolvidon, Norval and Tolvon but not usually in the United States. It can cause aplastic anemia and other effects on immune system cells.

Buck's team found that in addition to interfering with serotonin in the worm, it also blocked receptors for another neurotransmitter, octopamine.

They said some other research suggests that serotonin and octopamine may complement one another – with serotonin signalling the presence of food and octopamine signalling starvation.

Buck said it is possible that mianserin drug tips the balance in the direction of octopamine, tricking the brain into thinking it has been starved.

Petrascheck said another antidepressant, mirtazapine, had similar effects. An antihistamine and migraine drug called cyproheptadine, as well as a compound not used in people called methiothepin also affected serotonin and extended worm life span.

They tested other popular antidepressants that affect serotonin and found they did not make the worms live longer.

He is worried that people will rush to take the drugs in the hope of living longer.

"It is a stretch from a worm to a human being," Petrascheck said.