Yes this would no doub
Why? You'll still be able to get a full head of thick hair.
If the donor hair is weak, it stands to follow that the clones will be weak, too. That's if the clones inherit shortened telomeres.
Telomeric differences
As cells divide, their chromosomes get shorter. This is because the DNA sequences at both ends of a chromosome, called telomeres, shrink in length every time the DNA is copied. The older the animal is, the shorter its telomeres will be, because the cells have divided many, many times. This is a natural part of aging.
So, what happens to the clone if its transferred nucleus is already pretty old? Will the shortened telomeres affect its development or lifespan?
When scientists looked at the telomere lengths of cloned animals, they found no clear answers. Chromosomes from cloned cattle or mice had longer telomeres than normal. These cells showed other signs of youth and seemed to have an extended lifespan compared with cells from a naturally conceived cow. On the other hand, Dolly the sheep's chromosomes had shorter telomere lengths than normal. This means that Dolly's cells were aging faster than the cells from a normal sheep.
To date, scientists aren't sure why cloned animals show differences in telomere length.
http://learn.genetics.utah.edu/content/cloning/cloningrisks/
I sincerely hope Dr. Takashi Tsuji and his clinicians will offer to replenish the donor area full of cloned hairs from the
strongest hairs found on the back of the scalp. That way if you needed further treatment down the line, they could extract more of these cloned strong hairs.
This would be particularly important for: a) people with weak donor areas where strong hairs are in short supply and b) individuals who have had hair transplants and have depleted donor areas.
I hope the at the Riken image showing only the slick bald top of the scalp being treated is only to give an illustrative idea of what they are hoping for and is not the whole picture.
For this approach to be truely conclusive for all types of hair loss sufferers, it needs to treat ALL areas of the scalp, either as a matter of course or if the patient wants it.
Here is the illustration. Note it shows only the top being regenerated:
What seems to be the plan:
What needs to be the plan:
In fact this matter is so important that we should consider writing a forum group email to Dr. Tsuji, pleading with him to test his method on the entire head. Maybe Dr. Takashi doesn't realise that this matters to us (the consumers) and we should let him know!
If this cloning treatment came out and their system was to only treat the top of the head and crown and they only replicated cells for this assignment, neglecting the supposed "indestructible" horseshoe (not true!), many of us with thin sides and thin donor areas would feel sorely disappointed and this would only amount to a half cure where the top is effectively cured with thick new hairs but the other areas making up your scalp remained underwhelmingly battered and thin.
