# Why does hair go white with age? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [January 14, 2006, 2:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-hair-go-white-with-age/339960 "2006-01-14T14:35:11Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2006, 2:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-hair-go-white-with-age/339960/1 "2006-01-14T14:35:11Z")
In humans and dogs, hair goes white with age. Why? And why, on dogs, is it only around the muzzle - why not all over? and does it happen with other mammals? ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2006, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-hair-go-white-with-age/339960/2 "2006-01-14T14:54:40Z")
[Male gorillas develop silver hair on their backs](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gorilla#Gorilla_culture) at the age of 11-12, though with a life span of 30-50, it is not associated with old age. ---
**Author:** ![SnakesCatLady](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/4af34b/32.png) [@SnakesCatLady](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SnakesCatLady)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2006, 3:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-hair-go-white-with-age/339960/3 "2006-01-14T15:32:35Z")
I have wondered about that myself - especially since I am getting white hairs in my eyebrows! These are almost transparent they are so white. And some cats get greyer as they get older - my Gwen has gotten a lot greyer around her nose/mouth in the last few years. ---
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2006, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-hair-go-white-with-age/339960/4 "2006-01-14T16:37:23Z")
[This site](http://www.ohiohealth.com/healthreference/reference/C725D1E6-71FB-4C0B-AB64125D3619AD13.htm?category=questions) says that hair is colored because of cells at the root that produce melanin. With age they stop producing so much, or sometime any, but it doesn’t say why. I checked the SD archive and found nothing. Either Cecil has never addressed this (almost unthinkable) or my search skills are lousy. ---
**Author:** ![Ty\_Cobb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ee59a6/32.png) [@Ty\_Cobb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ty_Cobb)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2006, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-hair-go-white-with-age/339960/5 "2006-01-14T17:25:52Z")
One of the odd notions is that hair goes white from fright. Supposedly, many who faced the guilletine went white waiting in jail. Of course, these where usually noblemen who used dyed their hair. (In those days, the dye would just wash out, but they didn’t wash their hair much.) ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2006, 12:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-hair-go-white-with-age/339960/6 "2006-01-15T00:26:38Z")
Cecil does address that one in [Can hair turn white overnight from fright?](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a2_315b.html) ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2006, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-hair-go-white-with-age/339960/7 "2006-01-15T00:35:23Z")
> [@Northern Piper](#): > > In humans and dogs, hair goes white with age. Why? And why, on dogs, is it only around the muzzle - why not all over? and does it happen with other mammals? I’ve known elderly dark-furred dogs that went salt-and-pepper grey all over. Apparently the muzzle fur goes first, by a couple of years, though. My hunch is that we rarely see senectudinal animals. (Yeah, it’s a weird word, but it’s the proper one for “showing physical signs of old age.”) “Old” dogs, cats, horses, etc., are actually in later middle age as far as potential lifespan is concerned, and are often put down due to chronic ailments before they actually arrive at the equivalent of old age in a human. And wild animals rarely survive to elderliness. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2006, 12:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-hair-go-white-with-age/339960/8 "2006-01-15T00:40:05Z")
so it’s the equivalent of grey temples in humans? ---
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2006, 2:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-hair-go-white-with-age/339960/9 "2006-01-15T02:03:07Z")
> [@Northern Piper](#): > > so it’s the equivalent of grey temples in humans? Or a gray beard. ---
**Author:** ![cerberus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/71e660/32.png) [@cerberus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cerberus)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2006, 5:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-hair-go-white-with-age/339960/10 "2006-01-15T05:16:27Z")
The pigmentation cells wear out, as does everything else, with age. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2006, 5:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-hair-go-white-with-age/339960/11 "2006-01-15T05:25:10Z")
As for hair going gray with fright I am still young enough that I can count my gray hairs. While not having actually made a log of the appearance of gray hairs I would swear the ones I do possess each have a story attached to them. That is, one gray hair is a fight with my wife (now ex) or another is from work when a server crashed and so on. Again, nothing scientific about it but I really would say they seem to have appeared (or I have bothered to notice them) shortly after some intense period in my life. I am not getting enough of them that applying a story to each one is stretching my abilities but I offer this for whatever it is worth. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2006, 12:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-hair-go-white-with-age/339960/12 "2006-01-15T12:16:29Z")
I’ve had two lovebirds that lived long enough that some of their head feathers started losing their color. Just another datapoint. Parrots that live long enough will also sometimes start going bald, poor things. ---
**Author:** ![spingears](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ebca7d/32.png) [@spingears](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/spingears)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2006, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-hair-go-white-with-age/339960/13 "2006-01-15T20:21:05Z")
> [@Northern Piper](#): > > In humans and dogs, hair goes white with age. Why? And why, on dogs, is it only around the muzzle - why not all over? and does it happen with other mammals? Age is the most apparent cause. I knew a lady whose hair turned white at about 20-22 years of age. Lasted all her life.! No apparent cause. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![aurelian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f4b2a3/32.png) [@aurelian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aurelian)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2006, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-hair-go-white-with-age/339960/14 "2006-01-15T22:17:42Z")
And why does the white/ grey hair tend to be thicker than normal hair? ---
**Author:** ![Susie\_Derkins](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e47774/32.png) [@Susie\_Derkins](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Susie_Derkins)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2006, 10:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-hair-go-white-with-age/339960/15 "2006-01-15T22:28:06Z")
My hair started turning grey when I was around 26 and now that I am 32 it is at least 50/50. I used to have naturally spiral-curled hair, and now it’s more wavy than anything. I think it is partly the texture of the grey hair, and partly the fact that I keep it dyed. ---
**Author:** ![Club\_33](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/df705f/32.png) [@Club\_33](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Club_33)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2006, 10:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-hair-go-white-with-age/339960/16 "2006-01-15T22:57:38Z")
It would seem that stress can be a factor as well. I recall a number of Presidents that looked pretty young going into the White House and came out looking as if they had aged 20 years, white hair and all. ---
**Author:** ![choosybeggar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8c91f0/32.png) [@choosybeggar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/choosybeggar)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2006, 9:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-hair-go-white-with-age/339960/17 "2006-01-16T09:46:38Z")
The issue was addressed in this article: Nishimura EK, Granter SR, Fisher DE., Mechanisms of hair graying: incomplete melanocyte stem cell maintenance in the niche. Science. 2005 Feb 4;307(5710):720-4. In case the title doesn’t say it all, here’s the abstract (email me if you want full text) > [@](#): > > Hair graying is the most obvious sign of aging in humans, yet its mechanism is largely unknown. Here, we used melanocyte-tagged transgenic mice and aging human hair follicles to demonstrate that hair graying is caused by defective self-maintenance of melanocyte stem cells. This process is accelerated dramatically with Bcl2 deficiency, which causes selective apoptosis of melanocyte stem cells, but not of differentiated melanocytes, within the niche at their entry into the dormant state. Furthermore, physiologic aging of melanocyte stem cells was associated with ectopic pigmentation or differentiation within the niche, a process accelerated by mutation of the melanocyte master transcriptional regulator Mitf. ---
**Author:** ![MaryEFoo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba8739/32.png) [@MaryEFoo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaryEFoo)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2006, 9:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-does-hair-go-white-with-age/339960/18 "2006-01-16T21:59:32Z")
Aren’t there “white” horses that are born black and fade through grey to white? Do roans do the same thing?