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John F. Elliott, MD, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB Many people dye their hair, but only a small fraction of them develop allergic skin reactions to the dye, such as redness, severe itching, and sometimes blistering. Unfortunately once you develop the allergy it is usually with you for life. The chemical in hair dye which most often causes the allergic reaction is called para-phenylenediamine or PPD. In people who have hair dye allergy, the PPD molecule somehow triggers the immune system to attack the skin where the dye has touched. In this project we hope to find out what exactly is triggering the immune system to cause the PPD allergy. If we succeed we may be able to develop two different kinds of blood tests. One would screen for the genes that make it possible to become allergic to PPD—that is, it would tell you if you could become allergic to PPD. The other test would tell you if you actually were allergic. The techniques that we develop during this project will be useful to study other different chemicals that also cause allergic skin reactions. Success in this project will lead to a better understanding of how the immune system is controlled in the skin. This should contribute to progress in other skin diseases where an overactive immune system is causing a serious skin disease, such as in severe drug-induced skin reactions, or in psoriasis. © 2009 |
