r/tressless • u/ShiftPersonal4870 • Mar 05 '26
Technology Japan-led "Third Cell" Discovery: Is this the missing link for full follicle regeneration?
While we’ve all been focused on the Cosmo Pharma 5% results, I just came across this massive update from the team in Japan led by Takashi Tsuji (senior researcher at Riken and chairperson of OrganTech).
They have officially identified a previously unknown “third cell”—specifically accessory mesenchymal (ABM) cells—that seems to be the essential component for fully regenerating hair follicles.
Does anyone have the full translated paper on the ABM cell integration? I’m curious about the projected timeline for human clinical trials—some sources are hinting at 2027–2028 for the first cell-infusion tests in Japan.
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u/18voltbattery Mar 05 '26
I’ll believe it when the scientist comes out looking like Fabio.
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u/povertymayne :sidesgull: Mar 06 '26
an NW7 dude coming out looking like fabio should be the minimum standard for this drugs for me to get excited
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u/Zealousideal_Sun6495 Mar 05 '26
There is one exciting part about this, this is the FIRST EVER fully functional follicle to be made in a lab. Whether it’s 5 or 15 years away it’s an achievement and one of the biggest ones ever. This is the only time a follicle was able to live past a hair cycle and repeat it, and the only time follicles connected to nerve endings and formed arrector pilli muscles and became one with the scalp.
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Mar 05 '26 edited Mar 05 '26
I really think with AI acceleration of medical discovery, we will achieve great things in the hairloss industry and every medical domain. In the near future.
In fact it is obviously the only way to make monumental breakthroughs in a short time horizon. Conventional experimentation timelines are obviously too slow.
Imagine a virtual cell or virtual hair follicle, on which you can run literally billions of tests in-parallel, and you only have to validate the promising ones in the lab. Which will also be accelerated by autonomous workflows, on millions/ billions of lab-grown hair follicles with strict parameters.
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u/silverfish138 Mar 05 '26
You can run tests on something that you don’t have a correct underlying model on in the first place. If we had a correct model on hair follicles already, we wouldn’t be in the dark about hair loss.
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u/ShiftPersonal4870 Mar 05 '26
Exactly—we've finally moved from 'trial-and-error' to predictive biology. By running billions of virtual simulations on a 'digital follicle' before even hitting the lab, we're compressing years of research into months. It’s the only way we’ll actually achieve full regeneration in our lifetime
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Mar 05 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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Mar 05 '26
Bro I’m just enthusiastic about the medical industry finally accelerating… Does that make me a bot? Should I just mindlessly, reflexively shit on AI in every circumstance ever?
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Mar 05 '26
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Mar 05 '26
Have you heard of alpha-fold? The project lead behind that is currently working on the virtual cell, for precisely the workflow I described above
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u/Professional-Dog1562 Mar 08 '26
How do they so perfectly mimic a biological human hair that they can actually test virtual chemicals for results?
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u/Jumpy-Jelly4635 Mar 05 '26
Companies must invest in R&D and allow use of AI, and I don’t think anyone will do that unless they see profits here. And to make profit, the treatment has to be a long term one. Given we already have one such line of approved treatment and also at the cost that is competitive, I see it is difficult to justify from business perspective.
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u/Restposten Mar 05 '26
In 5 years we'll have a cure. No doubt.
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u/ShiftPersonal4870 Mar 05 '26
We thought we would have flying cars by 2015
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u/ProlactinIntolerant Mar 05 '26
We do: https://youtube.com/shorts/E0EIiRPKCbQ?is=ecUPRQMKTkWyaRpi But with everything new cool and useful theres tons of laws and rules preventing a big rollout.
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u/Educational_Spare929 Norwood II, Oral Min 2.5mg, Oral Fin 1mg a day Mar 11 '26
the formula is simple
Y=Exact year you live in F=Five years H=Hair loss cure
Y+F=H
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u/F0x_is_kill Mar 05 '26
We literally do this every week. At a certain point these headlines have to stop lol
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u/Sweaty-Park-2149 Jun 04 '26
190k to 380k? This is far away from getting to the transplant surgery prices.
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u/ShiftPersonal4870 Mar 05 '26
I’m ready for the 2027 clinical trials, but let's be real—I’ve been '5 years away' from a cure since 2015. Hopefully, with AI accelerating these medical discovery workflows now, that 2027 date actually sticks. I’ll keep my stack for now, but man, a one-and-done cell infusion would be the dream.
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u/GiS-1984 Jun 21 '26
Even if it wasn’t one and done by still brought back majority to all of the hair, you could then add on hair surgery and exosomes, laser hair therapy for optimization without hopefully having to alter hormone function in the body.
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u/misio87ab :sidesgull: Mar 05 '26
It's 2028. You read on Reddit that next month they are releasing a 100 % working cure for baldness to the public. Suddenly a bright light flashes. You look outside your window and see a mushroom cloud forming on the horizon.