Redheads feel less pain: people with red hair are less sensitive due to genetic peculiarities

Redheads feel less pain: people with red hair are less sensitive due to genetic peculiarities

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Redheads have a higher PAIN threshold than blondes or brunettes because their skin’s pigment-producing cells don’t have the function of a particular receptor, study reveals

  • Redheads have a defective receptor in the skin’s pigment cells that prevents them from tanning
  • But it also has a hormonal entrainment effect that results in an increased pain threshold
  • The end result is that gingers produce more signs of opioids than people with other hair colors and complexions and have a high pain threshold

By Joe Pinkstone for Mailonline

Published: | Updated:

Ginger can tolerate more pain than brunettes and blondes, and a new study has found why it happens.

He found that the skin cells that determine a person’s pigmentation, called melanocytes, are instrumental in deciding a person’s pain threshold.

Redheads have a genetic mutation, which means that their melanocytes have a defective version of a key receptor and therefore cannot produce dark pigment to obtain a tan.

An indirect effect of this is a chemical imbalance that leads to a cascade of different hormones that ultimately increases the effect of pain-blocking opioid receptors.

The end result is that gingers produce more signs of opioids than people with other hair colors and complexions, and therefore have a high pain threshold.

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Redheads have a genetic mutation, which means that their melanocytes have a defective version of a key receptor and therefore cannot produce dark pigment to obtain a tan. But an indirect effect of this is a chemical imbalance that leads to a cascade of different hormones that ultimately increases the effect of pain-blocking receptors (stock)

Redheads have a genetic mutation, which means that their melanocytes have a defective version of a key receptor and therefore cannot produce dark pigment to obtain a tan. But an indirect effect of this is a chemical imbalance that leads to a cascade of different hormones that ultimately increases the effect of pain-blocking receptors (stock)

Researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital observed red-haired mice in a laboratory.

The skin cells of rodents are similar to those of humans and the cause of red hair is comparable in both species.

Dr. David Fischer conducted an earlier study that found that people with red hair cannot create dark, tanned pigments as a result of a loss of functionality in melanocytes.

Gingers, the rarest of human hair colors, like all people, have a receptor on their melanocytes called melanocortin 1, which protrudes from the cell’s surface.

Gingers, the rarest of human hair colors, like all people, have a receptor on their melanocytes called melanocortin 1, which mediates the production of dark skin pigment. But in redheads it is a defect. This leads to a hormone level different from that of other complications and results in an elevated pain threshold (stockpile)

Gingers, the rarest of human hair colors, like all people, have a receptor on their melanocytes called melanocortin 1, which mediates the production of dark skin pigment. But in redheads it is a defect. This leads to a hormone level different from that of other complications and results in an elevated pain threshold (stockpile)

Getting gray ‘is caused by stress’

Scientists have finally proved what conventional wisdom has been telling us for decades – that getting stressed out makes your hair gray.

However, researchers at Columbia University also found that the process can be reversed in hair that has only recently gone gray.

Reducing stress can ward off gray hair, scientists say, and it is hoped that drugs can be developed to further prevent the unwanted process.

The study found that hair over the entire scalp can reverse aging. He also found that the beard and pubic hair can regain color after they start to turn gray.

Scientists believe that the root of the aging problem comes from changes in the metabolic pathways that make up the body’s proteins.

These pathways are strongly influenced by hormones produced when a person is stressed and, therefore, relieving stress can undo the process.

Its normal function is to control when the body begins to produce a dark brown or black pigment.

However, in redheads it does not work, causing the pale skin of many redheads that never gets tanned and is prone to sunburn.

But Dr. Fischer found that these defective receptors also alter the production of a chemical called POMC, which then breaks down into various hormones.

These hormones create a balance between pain-inhibiting and intensifying receptors.

In redheads, the damaged melanocortin 1 receptor causes less POMC to be produced and, therefore, they have lower levels of the derived hormones.

This means that the balance in redheads is at a lower concentration than in people with other hair colors.

This therefore increases the impact of other hormones – not produced by skin pigment cells – that increase the effect of pain-fighting opioid receptors.

As a result, redheads have a high pain threshold, conclude the researchers in their study, published in Science Advances.

“These findings describe the mechanistic basis behind previous evidence that suggests varying pain thresholds across different pigmentation sources,” says Dr. Fisher.

‘Understanding this mechanism provides validation of this previous evidence and valuable recognition for medical staff when caring for patients whose pain sensitivities can vary.’

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