White and Black or Black and White?

Today’s interesting fact has to do with the Zebra.

Zebras were traditionally considered to be white animals with black stripes.

This is because some zebras have white underbellies.

However recent research, involving the development of zebra embryos, have shown that their skin colour starts as black, and the white stripes and under belly are added on later in their development.

So Zebras are black with white stripes instead of the other way around.

Today’s interesting fact has to do with the Nectarine.

A lot of people think that nectarines are different species of plant than peaches.

Many people think it is a cross between a peach tree and a plum tree.

But there it is only a single gene difference between the two that changes the fuzzy skin, into a smooth skin. 

Sometimes a peach tree will have a mutation on a branch, and that branch will then have nectarines on it.

Today’s interesting fact has to do with Hair.

Many men lose their hair, either in part or totally.

The reasons for this have been studied for years, and only recently have they worked out what might be the process of hair loss.

They've known for years that hair follicles get smaller and smaller, producing thinner and finer hair until it seems there is none.

Most women and men, who don't lose their hair, have hair follicles that renew themselves mostly in their original form.

What causes these follicles to renew themselves is a small quantity of stem cells located at the root of each hair follicle.

Very recently researchers at Yale have identified that there is a signal that goes from adipose precursor cells in the tissue surrounding the hair follicles to the hair stem cells.

Before hair growth starts, the layer of fat under the skin thickens.

This thickening produces molecules that then stimulate the hair stem cells, to regenerate the hair follicle.

If you feel a part of a scalp that has hair, you will notice that the thickness of the tissue between the outer layer of the skin and above the skull is slightly thicker than that where you don't have hair.

If they can get the fat cells to signal the hair stem cells they may be able to reverse the hair loss.

That is of course, if human hair and skin, works the same as the mice they have been studying.

We chrome domes can only hope.