English Deutsch Français Italiano Español Português 繁體中文 Bahasa Indonesia Tiếng Việt ภาษาไทย
All categories

2006-12-12 20:01:50 · 3 answers · asked by Tommy K 1 in Health Diseases & Conditions Skin Conditions

3 answers

Each hair on our heads is made up of two parts:

a shaft - the colored part we see growing out of our heads
a root - the bottom part, which keeps the hair anchored under the scalp

The root of every strand of hair is surrounded by a tube of tissue under the skin that is called the hair follicle (say: fah-lih-kul). Each hair follicle contains a certain number of pigment cells. These pigment cells continuously produce a chemical called melanin (say: meh-luh-nin) that gives the growing shaft of hair its color of brown, blonde, red, and anything in between.

Melanin is the same stuff that makes our skin's color fair or darker. It also helps determine whether a person will burn or tan in the sun. The dark or light color of someone's hair depends on how much melanin each hair contains.

As we get older, the pigment cells in our hair follicles gradually die. When there are fewer pigment cells in a hair follicle, that strand of hair will no longer contain as much melanin and will become a more transparent color - like gray, silver, or white - as it grows. As people continue to get older, fewer pigment cells will be around to produce melanin. Eventually, the hair will look completely gray.

People can get gray hair at any age. Some people go gray at a young age - as early as when they are in high school or college - whereas others may be in their 30s or 40s before they see that first gray hair. How early we get gray hair is determined by our genes. This means that most of us will start having gray hairs around the same age that our parents or grandparents first did.

2006-12-12 20:05:25 · answer #1 · answered by CLoud9 3 · 1 0

Some people's hair starts going white much earlier than 30.

2006-12-13 05:09:31 · answer #2 · answered by nelabis 6 · 0 1

Not totally sure of the reasons why. But if one is trying to prevent it and/or lessen the amount of white hair..........my stylist told me that she has noticed one of her customer's had stopped the graying process, by taking an iron supplement.

So to answer your question, it could be a lack of something in one's diet.

2006-12-13 04:06:42 · answer #3 · answered by Staci C 3 · 0 1

fedest.com, questions and answers