Centre for Skin Sciences, School of Life Sciences, University of Bradford, Bradford, West Yorkshire, UK.
Pigment Cell Melanoma Res. 2011 Feb;24(1):75-88. doi: 10.1111/j.1755-148X.2010.00803.x. Epub 2010 Dec 6.
Although we have made significant progress in understanding the regulation of the UVR-exposed epidermal-melanin unit, we know relatively little about how human hair follicle pigmentation is regulated. Progress has been hampered by gaps in our knowledge of the hair growth cycle's controls, to which hair pigmentation appears tightly coupled. However, pigment cell researchers may have overly focused on the follicular melanocytes of the nocturnal and UVR-shy mouse as a proxy for human epidermal melanocytes. Here, I emphasize the epidermis-follicular melanocyte pluralism of human skin, as research models for vitiligo, alopecia areata and melanoma, personal care/cosmetics innovation. Further motivation could be in finding answers to why hair follicle and epidermal pigmentary units remain broadly distinct? Why melanomas tend to originate from epidermal rather than follicular melanocytes? Why multiple follicular melanocyte sub-populations exist? Why follicular melanocytes are more sensitive to aging influences? In this perspective, I attempt to raise the status of the human hair follicle melanocyte and highlight some species-specific issues involved which the general reader of the pigmentation literature (with its substantial mouse-based data) may not fully appreciate.
尽管我们在理解 UVR 暴露的表皮-黑色素单位的调节方面取得了重大进展，但对于人类毛囊色素沉着的调节机制，我们知之甚少。毛发生长周期的控制知识的空白阻碍了进展，而毛发色素沉着似乎与这些控制紧密相关。然而，色素细胞研究人员可能过于关注夜间和 UVR 回避的小鼠的毛囊黑素细胞，将其作为人类表皮黑素细胞的替代物。在这里，我强调人类皮肤的表皮-毛囊黑素细胞的多样性，将其作为白癜风、斑秃和黑色素瘤的研究模型，以及个人护理/化妆品创新的研究模型。进一步的动机可能在于寻找为什么毛囊和表皮色素单位仍然存在广泛的差异的答案？为什么黑色素瘤往往起源于表皮而不是毛囊黑素细胞？为什么存在多种毛囊黑素细胞亚群？为什么毛囊黑素细胞对衰老的影响更敏感？在这篇观点文章中，我试图提高人类毛囊黑素细胞的地位，并强调一些与物种特异性相关的问题，这些问题可能是色素沉着文献的普通读者（其中有大量基于小鼠的数据）没有完全理解的。
