Interesting - never heard of it:
Drug package insert: https://www.rxabbvie.com/pdf/latisse_pi.pdf
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Sorry you are correct a liquid. It’s a custom brew made by the hair doc. I am sure a hair specialist or maybe pharmacist can prepare for you. My hair doc is pretty connected with modern stuff. I told him about Rapamycin, sent him topical hair growth article, he was very interested.
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Gotya. I’m actually interested in fixing my beard, which is ‘patchy’ on the side. I used Minox for a year, which helped somewhat, but not completely. And a guy on a beard forum said Bimatoprost is what helped him. This might be good, but its expensive: FR 10 (10% Minoxidil Bimatoprost) - Minoxidil Its got Minox, Bitmat, and Retinol.
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ok, I’m a little skeptical of the above concoction. It’s got pretty much everything in it:
But it has GHK-Cu + a retinol, and GHK-Cu immediately breaks down when exposed to a retinol.
This seems similar to what I am using, and it does include retinol as well. Perhaps check around some hair clinics or ask pharmacists for better deal. You might be able to get a free hair clinic consult with an actual hair MD, might offer some better economic options for this product formulation.
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You can recreate this very inexpensively. Bimatoprost liquid is available inexpensively from many of the online Indian pharmacies we have in our list of reliable pharmacies (I just checked a few of them).
Then mix it with the minoxidil product you can buy inexpensively in the US at Costco, etc.
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How do you know this? Is there research on this topic, or do you have a chemistry background?
As I sit here mixing a batch from your recipe (thanks) a word of caution on the photos. My background is imaging and color science. The color reproduction parameters likely differ significantly between your May and July photos and could account for at least half of the improvement I perceive. Look, for example, at the fairly drastic difference in the color of your forehead from May to July. I suspect there has been no significant change in actual color. Now apply the same apparent photographic reproduction parametric change to your hair.
If you take your photos with the same camera settings, illumination, etc. you will reduce this confounding effect. Keep the pics coming!
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Who knew? I wish I had this information 40 years ago.
Maybe it’s Agetron’s exercise that is helping to grow that hair?
What is AICAR?
AICAR (5-aminoimidazole-4-carboxamide-1-β-D-ribofuranoside) is a substance produced naturally by the body that stimulates AMP activated protein kinase (AMPK), a protein that regulates metabolism in a variety of ways. AMPK acts as an energy regulator and is activated during exercise or other circumstances that use up cellular energy.
The AMPK-stimulating AICAR can also be synthesized in a lab and is being evaluated in preclinical research and human clinical trials as a therapeutic agent to treat certain metabolic disorders in humans.
“The unforeseen finding is that supplementation of a metabolite a-ketobutyrate (a-KB) in old mice can increase longevity and prevent alopecia.”
Well, I can’t get any AICAR, so maybe I need to exercise even more.
I have been taking alpha-ketoglutarate, so maybe I will grind some up and add to my rapamycin lotion.
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Somewhat… I have actually been tanning consistently… I also noticed how much tanner my forehead is… was getting base tan for trip to Florida beaches… 1st week of July. Pics taken in same bathroom lighting might be stronger from natural light.
Thanks for heads up… definitely growing new shafts… and thicker. Hoping for real significant change in a few months… lol. Kinda like a full head of hair!
It’s discussed in a lot of skincare forums. Here’s a bit of info here:
certain ingredients found in other skin care products could reduce the overall effect of copper peptides. You should avoid using copper peptides at the same time as the following ingredients:
- retinol
- vitamin C
- alpha hydroxy acids (AHAs), such as glycolic acid (if you’re using an AHA-containing chemical peel, you may use copper peptides after your treatment)
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The only issue is the bottles of bimatoprost are so tiny… and I’m not sure how many I’d need for efficacy. The guy who did this successfully, said he went through a a lot of bottles. Maybe I could make a concoction of Minox, Rapam, and Bimatoprost and take it for a spin.
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Another potent hair growth stimulating drug:
The immunosuppressive immunophilin ligand, cyclosporine A (CsA), is an 11-amino-acid cyclic peptide produced by Cylindrocarpon lucidum [1]. Since the discovery of its efficacy for the sup- pression of renal allograft rejection [2], CsA has become a staple of immunosuppressive therapy in clinical medicine for a wide range of immune-mediated diseases. …
CsA Is a Potent Hair Growth Stimulator
Perhaps the most intriguing and most common of the many adverse effects of CsA (Table 1) is the curiously strong hair growth stimulation this fungal product exerts in many patients receiving CsA, >88% of whom develop a reversible, drug-induced hypertrichosis [10]. Hypertrichosis describes the transformation of tiny vellus hair follicles (HFs), which produce a fine, short, and almost invisible hair shaft, into large terminal HFs that generate thick, long, pigmented hair [11]
In fact, no other drug used in clinical medicine more reliably stimulates human hair growth than CsA [12–14], albeit typically in cosmetically undesired locations. CsA directly targets the HF, promotes its hair shaft formation and prolongs the growth stage of the hair cycle (anagen) in organ-cultured human scalp HFs; that is, in the absence of systemic immunity [15,16]. Major hair growth stimulation is also seen in mice, where CsA activates both resting (telogen) HFs (Figure 1A) to enter into anagen [7] and suppresses the involution of anagen HFs into the apoptosis-driven regression stage of the hair cycle (catagen) [17,18] (Figure 1B).
These hair-growth-stimulatory effects cannot be toxicity induced, since cytotoxic agents almost invariably promote hair loss and catagen [19,20]. Immunosuppression also provides no persua- sive explanation, since even (already severely immunocompromised) nude mice (Foxn1-/-) shed their nudity and develop striking hair growth after CsA treatment [21], while other potent immuno- suppressants like glucocorticosteroids strongly induce catagen and freeze HFs in telogen [17,22]. Moreover, anagen induction by CsA in mice is accompanied by significant increases in the number of HF-associated mast cells, macrophages, T cells, and Langerhans cells [23]. We have therefore long argued that dissecting the unknown molecular mechanisms that drive CsA-induced hair growth stimulation promises important new insights into the as-yet-unclear molecular controls of human hair growth and into novel pharmacological strategies for targeting these controls [7,17].
As hair aficionados among dermatologists know well, the vellus-to-terminal HF transformation that underlies hypertrichosis represents a very complex and rather dramatic transformation pro- cess of a human (mini-)organ [27] that by no means can be explained only by NFAT-dependent apoptosis suppression in a regressing anagen HF [9] or by bulge stem cell activation in telogen HFs [26] (Figure 1A,B). Rather, this radical organ transformation process is primarily driven by the HF mesenchyme, namely by the uniquely inductive fibroblasts of its dermal papilla (DP). The number, volume, and papilla morphogen secretion of this mesenchymal command center of the HF dictate HF size and thus the thickness of the hair shaft and the duration of anagen, and therefore hair shaft length [19,28,29].
Full Paper:
Beyond the NFAT Horizon: From Cyclosporine A-Induced Adverse Skin Effects to
Novel Therapeutics
We exemplify this through our recent discovery that CsA suppresses the potent Wnt inhibitor, secreted frizzled related protein (SFRP)1, in human hair follicles, thereby promoting hair growth and causing hypertrichosis.
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More new info:
The researchers determined how a type of protein, TGF-beta, controls the process by which cells in hair follicles, including stem cells, divide and form new cells, or orchestrate their own death — eventually leading to the death of the whole hair follicle.
“TGF-beta has two opposite roles. It helps activate some hair follicle cells to produce new life, and later, it helps orchestrate apoptosis, the process of cell death,” Wang said.
As with many chemicals, it is the amount that makes the difference. If the cell produces a certain quantity of TGF-beta, it activates cell division. Too much of it causes apoptosis.
No one is entirely sure why follicles kill themselves. Some hypotheses suggest it is an inherited trait from animals shedding fur to survive hot summer temperatures or trying to camouflage.
Full article:
Research Paper referenced:
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A company working on rapamycin skin cream:
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I’ll make my own, thank you. 
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I’m offering this to people who want to avoid using DMSO. I’ve been reading a bunch of articles on the web about transdermal creams. Looks like body builders commonly use PhloJel Ultra as a transdermal carrier. Phlojel Ultra, or maybe plain Phlojel, is a mixture of isopropyl palmitate, lecithin, water, and Pluronic F127, a long-chain polymer. One site, EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT PHLOJEL, says that “Bioavailability ranges from 10 % to 60%.”
The site for U.S. customers contains this answer to a frequently asked question:
“Q. Is there any way to increase the absorption rate of Phlojel Ultra?
“A. There are both physiological and chemical means to increase absorption rate. These include: a) apply to freshly-washed skin; b) occlude the affected application area, e.g. a bandage; c) add penetration enhancers such as menthol, d-limonene; DMSO up to 15%; add other solvents such as alcohol, propylene glycol, glycerol, transcutol but only in small amounts; if blood levels are required apply the product to an area of the body where the skin thickness is thin, e.g. the wrists, the forearm, behind the ear.”
U.S. customers can purchase Phlojel Ultra here:
Order Phlojel Ultra
By the way, some websites state that certain penetration enhancers such as alcohol can dry and damage skin with long-term use.
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So as I alluded to… there is something else about the tonic besides hair growth. I have only been putting the tonic on my crown where the hair has thinned… ignoring everywhere else.
That said at the base of my neck… just above my hair line I have had an annoying area of eczema…psoriasis… acne?
Whatever it is… likely eczema… it has been bothering me off and on decades. I decided to put the tonic on it and within days it dried up. Just residual bumps. My hair dresser confirmed it is gone… yeah. I attribute this benefit to the Metformin in the tonic - as it is clinically proven to heal scarring, or cicatricial alopecia.
So… I had my hair cut last night and hair dresser confirmed no doubt new hair is coming in and thickening. She also confided to me that she is very surprised because nothing really ever works on regrowing hair. Tons of products - no results. She said – you got something here and took this pic. Lol Still wanting thicker!
May 10 … post treatment 10 days.
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I can see an entire of line of beauty/healthcare products in your future.
Kylie Kardashian and her beauty line, worth almost $1BB.
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