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3. Hair color: Blonde, red, brown, and black :: Posted Thursday, May 24, 2001 by admin ::
The hair roots or follicles contain pigment cells that, depending on your genetic background, creates a black pigment called melanin or eumelanin and a reddish pigment, produced by a separate gene, called heomelanin (or sometimes called phaeomelanin). The greater the amount of pigment sent to the hair, the darker the hair becomes. if the amount of pigment is reduced, the hair color turns brown and then reddish or blond. Color changes with age. Most "towheaded children" who have blonde-whitish hair turn into brunet adults.
The shades of hair color are influenced by how light bounces off the hair proteins, but basically depends upon pigment contained within the hair shaft center or cortex. Eumelanin is the pigment found in brown or black hair and to lesser degrees in blonde hair. Heomelanin, produces red hair while and mix of eumelanin and heomelanin produces a blonde-red mixture or "strawberry blonde". When pigment is significantly diminished, the hair appears gray and when it is absent, the hair is white.
Under severe stress hair or malnutrition, hair can loss its color. In the trench warfare of World War I, there were cases of young men whose hair turned gray within two months after prolonged episodes of severe fighting and artillery bombardments. Copper is the key nutrient in pigment (melanin) production in the skin and hair. A lack of sufficient dietary copper can cause hair to loss its color.
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