Cells, growth factors and biomaterials used in tissue engineering for hair follicles regeneration

Alopecia is a common and distressing medical condition that has affected a majority of people world-wide, which leads to great effects on the quality of life and self-esteem. Numerous treatments had been used to cure alopecia, including hair growth stimulants, herbal products, and hair transplantation. However, these treatments have their side effects, such as hypertrichosis, edema, and even cardiovas-cular adverse effects, which lead to the urgent requirement to explore a new hair-follicle (HF) regen-eration approach. Tissue engineering could be the potential way for HF regeneration by simulating the epithelial-mesenchymal interaction and cell-extracellular matrix interactions. This review summarized the potential cells that are used in tissue engineering, commonly used tissue engineering techniques, and most importantly, the biomaterials that have been applied for in vitro three-dimensional cell culture or in vivo co-transplantation in HF regeneration. The literature shows that advances in this field toward functional HF development have progressively increased. Although the clinical application of biomaterial co-transplantation for HF regeneration still faces various challenges, numerous studies have proved that this is a promising direction that could be achieved in the future. (c) 2022, The Japanese Society for Regenerative Medicine. Production and hosting by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/

Automated summary

Alopecia is a common medical condition that affects a majority of people worldwide, leading to significant impacts on quality of life and self-esteem. Current treatments for alopecia have side effects, prompting the need to explore new hair-follicle regeneration approaches. Tissue engineering shows promise in regenerating hair follicles by simulating cellular interactions, and biomaterials play a crucial role in this process.