PDRN — the salmon-DNA ingredient of the "skin booster" trend — is now sold for hair: scalp injections at clinics and PDRN shampoos, conditioners and scalp serums on shop shelves. This page counts what has been studied as of 3 November 2026: the scalp-injection studies, what each measured and against what, the trial registry, and what five PDRN scalp products declare on their labels. It ranks no product and gives no treatment advice.
What PDRN is and where it comes from are on our main PDRN page. For the wider question of what helps hair grow and how minoxidil's evidence is measured, see peptides for hair growth; the neighbouring regenerative ingredient sold for the scalp is covered on exosomes for hair.
The literature, counted
A PubMed search on 3 November 2026 for PDRN, polydeoxyribonucleotide or polynucleotides together with hair, alopecia or scalp returned 14 records. Read title by title, most share only a word: wound-healing gels, enzyme genetics, a hereditary hearing-loss gene, a laser-hair-removal complication, a consensus statement on aesthetic polynucleotide use. Three concern hair loss treated with a DNA-fragment product:
| Study | Who | What was given | What was measured | Result | Comparison |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lee et al., Wound Repair Regen 2015 (PMID 25524027) | 40 Korean women with female pattern hair loss | 12 weekly PDRN injections around the follicles; 20 of the 40 also had one platelet-rich plasma (PRP) session first | hair count and thickness | PDRN alone: count +17.9%, thickness +13.5%; PRP + PDRN: +23.2%, +16.8% (thickness difference between groups significant, count not) | each woman against her own baseline; no untreated group |
| Thanasarnaksorn et al., Arch Dermatol Res 2025 (PMID 39951159) | 28 patients with androgenetic alopecia, Thailand | four injections of a branded polynucleotide product, four weeks apart | hair diameter and density by dermoscopy; satisfaction | both rose from month 1; dermatologist: 60.7% "stabilized"; patients: 82.1% "improved"; no serious side effects | baseline only; no control |
| Samadi et al., Arch Dermatol Res 2024 (PMID 38842633) | pattern hair loss, Iran | a polynucleotide-based gel | efficacy and tolerability | published as a letter; no abstract in PubMed | — |
The 2015 study also tested PRP on rabbit skin, where it raised growth-factor and WNT signalling — a finding about PRP, not about PDRN.
Two limits bind everything in the table. There is no placebo or untreated group in either study with results, so any rise in hair count cannot be separated from natural variation, seasonal shedding, regression toward the mean, or other treatments patients were using. And both are injection studies: the product was put into the scalp with a needle. Nothing in them speaks to a product that is washed through the hair and rinsed off.
The 2025 authors attribute the effect to blood-vessel growth and reduced cell death; neither mechanism was measured in their patients.
The registry
On 3 November 2026 ClinicalTrials.gov returned no study for "polynucleotide AND (alopecia OR hair loss)", "polydeoxyribonucleotide AND (alopecia OR hair)" or "PDRN AND hair". No controlled trial of PDRN for hair is registered there as running, finished or planned.
What PDRN scalp products declare
The five PDRN hair and scalp products found on INKEEDecoder (formerly INCIDecoder) on 3 November 2026, read from their ingredient lists:
| Product | Ingredients listed | Sodium DNA position | Amount stated | Also contains |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Aromatica Rosemary PDRN Scalp Serum | 57–60 (two listings) | 18th | — | biotin, caffeine |
| Medicube Rosemary PDRN Scalp Serum | 90 | 23rd | — | biotin, caffeine, several growth-factor-like "SH-" peptides |
| VT PDRN Reedle Shot Hair Ampoule (100, 300, 700 DL) | 110 | 35th | — | caffeine, acetyl hexapeptide-8 and other peptides |
| Medicube Rosemary PDRN Hair & Scalp Conditioner | 83 | 54th | — | biotin, caffeine |
| Medicube Rosemary PDRN Cooling Thickening Shampoo | 107 | 67th | — | biotin, caffeine, "SH-" peptides |
None states how much DNA it contains. Every one combines it with other ingredients sold for hair — caffeine in all five, biotin in four, peptides in three — so even a product study, if one existed, could not attribute an effect to the DNA. The shampoo and conditioner are rinsed off. Our peptide shampoo and peptide hair serum pages cover the peptide side of the same labels.
The size question
PDRN fragments in the trial literature are large molecules — tens of thousands of daltons — set against the rough 500-dalton line for what passes intact skin, as our PDRN vs peptides page sets out. The scalp is skin with follicles in it, and follicles are sometimes described as a way in; no study found measures whether DNA from a scalp product reaches the follicle at all.
What is and is not established
- Two small, uncontrolled studies report more and thicker hair after a course of PDRN or polynucleotide scalp injections, against patients' own baselines.
- No placebo-controlled or registered trial of PDRN for hair exists.
- No study tests a PDRN shampoo, conditioner or leave-on scalp serum.
- PDRN has never been compared with minoxidil, finasteride or any other approved hair-loss treatment.
Hair loss has many causes, some of them medical; working out which one applies, and which treatments have evidence for it, is a job for a dermatologist or doctor.
Sources
Opened 3 November 2026: PubMed search (polydeoxyribonucleotide[tiab] OR PDRN[tiab] OR polynucleotide*[tiab]) AND (hair[tiab] OR alopecia[tiab] OR scalp[tiab]) (14 records, every title read); abstracts of Lee SH et al., Wound Repair Regen 2015, PMID 25524027; Thanasarnaksorn W et al., Arch Dermatol Res 2025, PMID 39951159; record of Samadi A et al., Arch Dermatol Res 2024, PMID 38842633 (letter); retraction filter (polydeoxyribonucleotide[tiab] OR PDRN[tiab]) AND Retracted Publication[pt] (2 records, neither on hair). ClinicalTrials.gov API v2 searches as listed above (0 each). INKEEDecoder product pages for the five products in the table, searched with "pdrn hair", "pdrn scalp", "pdrn shampoo" and "salmon dna hair". Corrections go to the contact page.