Most of us begrudgingly accept aging as a part of life – but maybe we don’t have to. A new study led by scientists at Harvard Medical School has identified chemical cocktails that can restore cells to a more youthful state, paving the way for aging-reversal treatments that are more accessible than gene therapy.
The genome may contain all the genetic data needed to make an organism, but it’s not the whole picture. There’s an extra layer of information sitting on top of it called the epigenome, which instructs different cells to express specific genes vital to their function. To put it another way, the genome is like a thick instruction manual while the epigenome is the table of contents that points heart cells to the chapter relevant to their job, brain cells to their chapter, etc.
In 2006, a team of Japanese scientists discovered molecules called Yamanaka factors that reprogram the epigenome to revert adult cells back to a stem cell state. This Nobel-Prize-winning work has since fueled a flurry of research into induced pluripotent stem cells and anti-aging treatments.
The Harvard Medical School team previously used gene therapy to deliver Yamanaka factors into mice, which effectively “reboots” the epigenome and reverses aging symptoms. However, gene therapy can be expensive and tricky to administer to patients, so in the new study the researchers screened for chemicals that might work the same way.
They set up systems of cell samples exposed to different chemicals and monitored them for specific protein signals that indicated the health of the cells, distinguishing between youthful, old and senescent (or inactive) cells. In doing so, the team identified six chemical cocktails that appeared to restore the cells to more youthful states. Better yet, this aging reversal took place in under a week.
“Until recently, the best we could do was slow aging. New discoveries suggest we can now reverse it,” said David Sinclair, lead scientist on the study. “This process has previously required gene therapy, limiting its widespread use.”
The researchers say that this kind of epigenetic treatment could not only reverse aging, but prevent or treat common diseases such as cancer, Alzheimer’s, diabetes and cardiovascular disease.
Of course, there’s still much more work to be done. Animal testing will need to follow, before any eventual human trials could be conducted. But still, it’s intriguing that ailing health from aging might not be as inevitable as we think it is.
“This new discovery offers the potential to reverse aging with a single pill, with applications ranging from improving eyesight to effectively treating numerous age-related diseases,” said Sinclair.
The research was published in the journal Aging.
Source: Aging
