Rejuvenation biotechnology is beginning to pick up steam, with major companies, political activism, and new approaches on the horizon. Let’s see what’s been done in January.
LEAF News
Creating Political Action to Increase Healthy Human Lifespan: A recent online discussion panel revealed some valuable insights into the political aspects of increasing healthy human lifespans. Perhaps the most exciting part of the panel involves the idea that getting politicians to support longevity/aging therapeutics might not be as hard as people may think.
EARD2021
Drugs to Reverse Atherosclerosis [Repair Biotechnologies]: Reason, the CEO of Repair Biotechnologies, discussed a new method of enabling macrophages to consume cholesterol without turning into foam cells, dying, and leading to atherosclerosis.
The Difference Between Longevity and Rejuvenation: João Pedro de Magalhães discussed the difference between longevity and rejuvenation along with the need for more ambitious research.
Lifespan News
New Year’s Resolutions: Ryan O’Shea outlines Peter Diamandis’ recommendations on how to live a longer life. Most of this advice is simple and well-known, although a few items might be surprising.
United Against Aging: Ryan O’Shea shows how the Alliance for Longevity Initiatives brings both major U.S. political parties together to fight aging. This newly launched organization, founded to advance legislation and policies that aim to increase healthy human lifespan, recently held its first public event.
Altos Labs Announces Billions: Ryan O’Shea talks about how one of the market’s biggest players, well-known Amazon mogul Jeff Bezos, is putting forward money to fight against aging. Altos Labs is developing technology to bring cellular epigenetics back towards a youthful state.
Is Altos Labs a Longevity Company?: Despite working on epigenetic reprogramming, which is one of the hallmarks of aging, Altos Labs has expressly denied being a longevity company. Ryan O’Shea explains why that might be the case.
Is Aging a Disease?: World Health Organization included aging in the International Classification of Diseases, version 11. This doesn’t change the biology of aging, but it could change how it is perceived by the medical community.
Science to Save the World
Crypto for Good: We continue last month’s discussion about crypto by bringing up the relationship of cryptocurrencies and longevity, focusing on VitaDAO and related innovations along with ways that they can be used to benefit longevity research and society as a whole.
Crypto and the Environment: However, there are serious concerns about crypto. We discuss its environmental issues, particularly regarding cryptocurrency that uses energy-intensive mining practices, and methods of mitigating them.
Rejuvenation Roundup Podcast
Ryan O’Shea of Future Grind hosts this month’s podcast, showcasing the events and research discussed here.
Journal Club
CAR T Cells Produced in Vivo to Treat Cardiac Injury: Hosted by Dr. Oliver Medvedik, Journal Club has returned on Tuesday 25th January at 12:00 Eastern and was broadcast live on the Lifespan.io Facebook page. This month’s paper was on how cells can be produced in living organisms in order to treat heart damage.
Interviews
Dr. Brian Kennedy: From Sickcare to Healthcare: Dr. Brian Kennedy is a longevity heavyweight: a former President of the Buck Institute, currently a Distinguished Professor in the Department of Biochemistry and Physiology at the National University of Singapore, a co-editor of Aging Cell, and one of the researchers behind a recent study of alpha-ketoglutarate that resulted in winding back chronological age in humans.
Sonia Arrison: “Aging Is One of the Last Unifying Issues”: Sonia Arrison is an entrepreneur, investor, and best-selling author. She discusses how aging is something important enough to bring together people on opposite sides of the political divide
Education
First pig-to-human heart transplant: what can scientists learn?: Transplanting genetically modified pig hearts into people has been a long-held dream, and this article from Nature explores the details of the procedure and how well it has worked.
The Animal Life Expectancy Comparisons Research Tool (ALEC): Dr. Leon Peshkin talks us through a new open access research tool that he has helped to develop and that is free for researchers to use now. The goal is to test whether animals subjected to an intervention show a statistically significant difference in lifespan compared to a control group.
Advocacy and Analysis
Debate Rages on the Inclusion of Old Age in the ICD-11: A significant debate has originated regarding the inclusion of MG2A, a code for old age, in the ICD-11 for Mortality and Morbidity Statistics. The 11th revision of the International Classification of Diseases, which goes into effect this month, is managed by the World Health Organization.
Why the Future of Cryptocurrency Matters for Longevity: 93% of the world’s money is now digital, held in virtual ledgers across banks and other financial institutions. With the increasing digitalization of financial services, there is no doubt that we are heading for a cashless future; the only question is what that future will look like.
Objecting to Rejuvenation is Objecting to Medicine: Some people are uneasy about the idea of extending human healthy lifespan by using rejuvenation technologies that target the aging process directly, or they not always convinced that developing them is a good idea. This article looks at the question from a different perspective, asking what people from medieval Europe would think of current biotechnology.
A Current Overview of Rejuvenation Techniques: Vadim Gladyshev and his team have published a review in Aging Cell about the current techniques and innovations in rejuvenation biotechnology, providing an overview of how these researchers see the state of the field.
Research Roundup
A Relationship Between Senescence and Respiratory Infections: A study published in Aging Cell has shown that senescent cells impact the way that CD4 T cells differentiate into types and that senolytics can restore this differentiation to a more youthful one.
Benefits of Exercise Can Be Transferred via Plasmapheresis: Scientists have transferred the neuroprotective effects of exercise to sedentary mice via plasma transfusion and identified an obscure protein that might be responsible for the effect.
The Effects of Spermidine on Heart Mitochondria in Mice: The latest research published in the Journal of Anatomy found that spermidine alters the morphology of mitochondria in aged mouse heart tissue.
A Supplement Combination Improves Memory in Older Adults: An open-access human study published in Clinical Nutrition has found that a combination of supplements is beneficial for working memory. The authors highlight some of the specific dietary components that selectively accumulate in the brain with biochemical effects.
Osteopontin Bone Remodeling May Be Key to Arthritis: A study published in Aging has found that osteopontin’s effects on bone remodeling may be at least partially responsible for osteoarthritis.
New Combination Treatment Shows Promise Against Dementia: Scientists have combined the popular antibiotic rifampicin with resveratrol to create a possible preventative treatment for age-related dementias.
Genetically Engineered T Cells Reduce Cardiac Fibrosis: Scientists have created genetically engineered T cells that target activated cardiac fibroblasts in a transient manner, alleviating symptoms of cardiac injury.
Isthmin 1 as a Biomarker and Therapeutic Target for Aging: A recent study published in Biogerontology has discovered a potential new aging biomarker and longevity therapeutic target. Ism1 is not a well-known protein, but it has been shown to play a role in multiple aspects of biology.
The Effects of Metformin and Lifestyle on Mortality: An outcomes study conducted by the Diabetes Prevention Program (DPP) has examined the effects of lifestyle interventions and the popular diabetes drug metformin on all-cause mortality.
Key Parkinson’s Protein Required for Immune Function: A study published in Cell Reports has found a-synuclein, the fundamental protein of Parkinson’s disease, to be critical in immune function.
A Nitrone Compound Protects the Spinal Cords of Mice: Publishing in GeroScience, a team of Oklahoma City researchers has found that a nitrone compound with a low molecular weight, OKN-007, maintains motor neuron functionality in the spinal cords of aging mice.
Fasting-Mimicking Diet Helps Fight Cancer: In the first human trial of its kind, scientists showed that a fasting-mimicking diet can work synergistically with conventional therapies in cancer patients, altering their metabolisms and reshaping their immune systems.
Quercetin Improves Bone Regeneration in Older Rats: A new study in ACS Applied Materials and Interfaces used a combined geroscience and tissue engineering approach to regenerate bone in aged rats. Tissue engineering and longevity therapeutics are often viewed as competing strategies, but this study proves how they can synergize.
Epigenetic Age Acceleration Is Linked to Hearing Loss: Using the long-running Baltimore Longitudinal Study of Aging as its data source, a study published in Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience examined the relationship between epigenetic age acceleration and hearing.
Heat Shock Protein Fights Senescence in Macular Degeneration: Researchers publishing in Experimental Eye Research have discovered that the peptide aB-crystallin can reduce the cellular senescence that affects the progression of age-related macular degeneration (AMD). aB-crystallin is a well-known heat shock protein, a family of proteins that is used in temperature regulation.
Telomerase Alleviates Alzheimer’s Symptoms not via Telomeres: Scientists publishing in Nature Aging have shown that telomerase reverse transcriptase slows neurodegeneration in a way that doesn’t have anything to do with its telomere-building activity.
Cellular Reprogramming Rejuvenates Multiple Organs in Mice: In a preprint showcased in bioRxiv, scientists have shown that a single cycle of partial cellular reprogramming, which resets cells back to a youthful epigenetic state, can reverse multiple age-related changes in mice, including in the spleen and liver.
Meta-Analysis Discovers Goldilocks Zone for IGF-1: A new meta-analysis from Aging Cell has shown that both high and low levels of IGF-1 are related to mortality risk. Insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1) IGF-1 is one of the body’s major metabolic hormones. It can have effects similar to insulin, and it mediates the effects of growth hormone.
Dietary Fiber and Probiotics Affect Melanoma Immunotherapy: A study published by Dr. Jennifer A. Wargo and her colleagues spanning multiple centers recently examined if dietary fiber and commercially available probiotics affect immunotherapy response in cancer patients. They hypothesized that bacteria from two probiotic species would be associated with a response to this therapy.
Senolytics Restore Cognitive Ability in Aged Rats: Polish researchers publishing in Aging have discovered that the well-known senolytic combination of dasatinib and quercetin improves the cognitive capabilities of older rats through improving the plasticity of dendrites.
Affecting Basic Metabolism to Reduce Senescence: Publishing in Aging, a group of Korean researchers has discovered a compound that affects the way our mitochondria process energy, ameliorating cellular senescence.
Acute multidrug delivery via a wearable bioreactor facilitates long-term limb regeneration and functional recovery in adult Xenopus laevis: The first step was to stimulate limb regeneration in frogs; ideally, this research can continue to be successful in small mammals and people.
Mitochondrial transplantation improves anxiety- and depression-like behaviors in aged stress-exposed rats: Overall, mitotherapy improved anxiety-and depression-like behaviors in aged rats and it could be considered as a new therapeutic strategy for age-related depressive disorders.
Transfer of the longevity-associated variant of BPIFB4 gene rejuvenates immune system and vasculature by a reduction of CD38+ macrophages and NAD+ decline: In conclusion, the new senotherapeutic action of LAV-BPIFB4 may offer a valuable therapeutic tool to control aging and reduce the burden of its pathophysiological disorders, such as cardiovascular diseases.
Effect of Urolithin A Supplementation on Muscle Endurance and Mitochondrial Health in Older Adults A Randomized Clinical Trial: Although the improvements in the 6-minute walk distance and maximal ATP production in the hand muscle were not significant, long-term urolithin A supplementation was beneficial for muscle endurance and plasma biomarkers, suggesting that urolithin A may counteract age-associated muscle decline.
Association of Metformin with the Mortality and Incidence of Cardiovascular Events in Patients with Pre-existing Cardiovascular Diseases: Metformin use is associated with a reduction in all-cause mortality, cardiovascular mortality, incidence of coronary revascularisation, and heart failure in patients with cardiovascular disease; however, metformin usage was not associated with reduction in the incidence of myocardial infarction, angina, or stroke.
Oral Administration of Nicotinamide Mononucleotide Increases Nicotinamide Adenine Dinucleotide Level in an Animal Brain: These results demonstrate that oral gavage of 400 mg/kg NMN successfully increases brain NAD+ levels in mice after 45 min. These findings provide evidence that NMN may be used as an intervention to increase NAD+ levels in the brain.
Low-dose chloroquine treatment extends the lifespan of aged rats: Collectively, these results suggest that low-dose chloroquine alleviates senescence in prematurely aged stem cells.
DunedinPACE, a DNA methylation biomarker of the pace of aging: DunedinPACE showed high test-retest reliability, was associated with morbidity, disability, and mortality, and indicated faster aging in young adults with childhood adversity.
Differential Effects of One Meal per Day in the Evening on Metabolic Health and Physical Performance in Lean Individuals: A single meal per day in the evening lowers body weight and adapts metabolic flexibility during exercise via increased fat oxidation, whereas physical performance was not affected.
The Danaid Theory of Aging: The researchers argue that, in complex forms of life like humans, various restrictions on maintenance and repair may be inherent, and they show how such restrictions are laid out during development.
News Nuggets
Altos Labs’ $3 Billion Launch to Reverse Cellular Aging: In September 2021, we reported that Altos Labs was about to launch an ambitious project to develop partial cellular reprogramming to the point where it could be safely used in humans to reverse cellular aging. That launch has now officially started, and Altos Labs is shaping up to be a real contender in the battle against epigenetic alterations.
A New Startup Is Going After Rogue Cells: In a blog post, the founder and CEO of Arda Therapeutics, Adam Freund, explained his company’s intriguing strategy along with why it is imperative to counter aging.