Can bone marrow transplants affect the recipients characteristics like for examp!
Question: Have relations with cancer and this question came up, the idea that bone marrow transplants could affect bodily characteristics like hair color is to me strange because I can't see the mechanism how this would occur. Is it true?
Answers: Have relations with cancer and this question came up, the idea that bone marrow transplants could affect bodily characteristics like hair color is to me strange because I can't see the mechanism how this would occur. Is it true?
No, not the hair color, all the the chemo used in treatment and the conditioning regimen for the transplant can. This is usually temporary though.
This probably came up because bone marrow transplants change a part of your dna. The marrow and blood of the patient will change to that of the donor.
For example, I had a transplant this summer. While the rest of my body is uneffected, my marrow and blood now has the dna of my donor, rather than my own dna. My blood type also changed to that of my donor, from 0+ to a+.
However, the dna in the blood does not effect other physical characteristics of the body.
Anyone who goes through any kind of transplant goes through this. For example, someone with a kidney transplant. The new kidney will have the dna of the donor, not the patient.
This is called chimerism. Wiki has some good info about this phenomana and how it occurs in science as well as nature. In fact, it is more common than orginially though. However, you dont know it until you do dna tests. For example, while not all, but a lot of people with two diff eye colors are chimeras.
Anyways, look up www.marrow.org, it has a lot of info about the transplant and how it works.
Hi, I think what makes the hair color change is the chemotherapy. Somehow, chemotherapy makes the hair regrow thicker and darker. Some that were blond with straight hair regrew dark curly hair after chemo. Now how drugs screw up with you, that's a hard question. Scientist know how the drug cures you, but they never know how side effects work or happen
The cells that are transplanted in bone marrow transplants are blood cells (hematopoietic cells). These cells can differentiate into the various blood cells (rbc, wbc, platelets), they cannot become skin, hair or other cell types. So the answer to your question is no the bone marrow transplant will not affect hair color or other characteristics.
Hope this is helpful!