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The effect of age and hair colour on human hairbulb tyrosinase activity
Author(s) -
LLOYD T.,
GARRY FRANCES L.,
MANDERS E.K.,
MARKS J.G.
Publication year - 1987
Publication title -
british journal of dermatology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.304
H-Index - 179
eISSN - 1365-2133
pISSN - 0007-0963
DOI - 10.1111/j.1365-2133.1987.tb05866.x
Subject(s) - tyrosinase , chemistry , biochemistry , biology , medicine , enzyme
SUMMARY We Studied tyrosinase activity from human hairbulbs from 51 subjects, aged 5–72 years. We used anagen hairbulbs and grouped the subjects according to hair colour. We did not observe an age‐dependent fall in hairbulb tyrosinase activity. We observed considerable inter‐individual variation in activity, with a range of 8–342 pmol DOPA formed/three hairbulbs/30 min. The mean tyrosinase activity from red hairbulbs was significantly higher than the mean for the other hair colours. White hairbulbs did not express tyrosinase activity, and specific antibodies to tyrosinase were used to establish that tyrosinase antigen was absent from white hairbulbs.