From the Maximum Life Foundation blog, a video from the Manhattan Beach Project meeting on the projected cost and time taken to develop various aging-slowdown or actual rejuvenation therapies: “How much will it cost and how long will it take to develop an effective caloric restriction mimetic - one that will add many years if not decades to the human lifespan? What will it take to come up with a drug that turns on telomerase and thus lengthens telomeres? How about immune system restoration, tissue/organ storage, mitochondrial medicine, and other medical technologies?” For another perspective on time and cost, you might look at the SENS Foundation information on pushing to completion therapies for the seven contributing aspects of aging. We could expect working rejuvenation in mice with ten years of work and a billion dollars, for example - the challenge has always been convincing people that this is in fact the case, and raising those funds. Predicting how long it will take to move from mice to people is much harder, as this depends far more on regulation and politics than anything else. Two decades doesn’t seem unreasonable in the present environment.
View the Article Under Discussion: http://maxlifefoundation.typepad.com/maximum-life-foundation/2010/02/david-kekich-how-long-will-it-take-and-how-much-will-it-cost-to-cure-aging.html
Read More Longevity Meme Commentary: http://www.longevitymeme.org/news/
Researchers have been killing cancer cells in the lab through a combination of targeted nanoparticles and laser heating for a couple of years now, but here is an interesting advance on that method: scientists “have discovered a new technique for singling out individual diseased cells and destroying them with tiny explosions. The scientists used lasers to make ‘nanobubbles’ by zapping gold nanoparticles inside cells. In tests on cancer cells, they found they could tune the lasers to create either small, bright bubbles that were visible but harmless or large bubbles that burst the cells. … Single-cell targeting is one of the most touted advantages of nanomedicine, and our approach delivers on that promise with a localized effect inside an individual cell. The idea is to spot and treat unhealthy cells early, before a disease progresses to the point of making people extremely ill. … In laboratory studies published last year [researchers also] applied nanobubbles to arterial plaque. They found that they could blast right through the deposits that block arteries. …The bubbles work like a jackhammer. … nanobubble technology could be used for ‘theranostics,’ a single process that combines diagnosis and therapy. In addition, because the cell-bursting nanobubbles also show up on microscopes in real time, [the] technique can be use for post-therapeutic assessment, or what physicians often refer to as ‘guidance.’”
View the Article Under Discussion: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2010-02/ru-rpk020410.php
Read More Longevity Meme Commentary: http://www.longevitymeme.org/news/
From the Huffington Post, an article on the science and practice of calorie restriction that focuses on extended longevity, and so manages to omit mention of the demonstrated health benefits in human studies: “The science of aging is among the most dynamic and provocative in modern biology. Over the past two decades we have seen a virtual explosion in research investigating the molecular and behavioral systems that control the aging process. But the more researchers uncover about the science of aging, the more questions emerge. Dietary restriction has long been considered the most potent regulator of aging. Restricting food intake by any means induces a series of metabolic changes in organisms from yeast to primates that serve to extend life. Studies are currently underway to investigate the ability of dietary restriction to extend life in humans. … The genes linking diet and aging are highly conserved through evolution, indicating that there is a great chance human aging is sensitive to diet. Indeed, insulin-related genes have been found to be important in long-lived human populations. This suggests that the pathways discovered in worms and other organisms have similar functions in humans. What is not clear is how much influence diet has on lifespan and to what extent we are able to manipulate it.”
View the Article Under Discussion: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/darya-pino/can-you-live-longer-by-cu_b_447907.html
Read More Longevity Meme Commentary: http://www.longevitymeme.org/news/
Via ScienceDaily: “Stem cell researchers exploring a new approach for the care of respiratory diseases report that an experimental treatment involving transplantable lung cells was associated with improved outcomes in tests on mice with acute lung injury. … Respiratory diseases are a major cause of mortality and morbidity worldwide. Current treatments offer no prospect of cure or disease reversal. Transplantation of pulmonary progenitor cells derived from human embryonic stem cells may provide a novel approach to regenerate endogenous lung cells destroyed by injury and disease. … [Researchers] used a genetic selection procedure they created to generate a type of lung cell known as alveolar epithelial type II, which secretes surfactant, a substance that keeps the lung inflated, and can turn into another important lung cell that regulates the transfer of oxygen into the blood and the removal of carbon dioxide. … the experimental stem cell treatment [not only] prevented or reversed visual hallmarks of pulmonary injury, but also restored near normal lung function to mice. … additional tests in other animal models and eventually humans will be needed before these cell transplants can be used to treat respiratory diseases.”
View the Article Under Discussion: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/02/100203091221.htm
Read More Longevity Meme Commentary: http://www.longevitymeme.org/news/
Source:Working on Lung Regeneration
First generation stem cell therapies are offered in many locations around the world, and medical tourism is booming, but what sort of due diligence should you perform before trying to take advantage of a particular therapy? Here are some good suggestions: “The International Cellular Medicine Society (ICMS) has promulgated laboratory, practice standards and maintains a non-profit stem cell treatment registry. The easiest way to determine if the cell therapy is credible is to see if the clinic is ICMS certified. … The development of treatment protocols for stem cells is difficult and disease as well as tissue specific. This means that valid treatment isn’t as easy as sprinkling magic stem cells on the patient. For example, the treatment protocol for knee osteoarthritis has a completely different approach than cardiac disease. Some stem cell clinics are operating at a high level focus on a small collection of diseases and perfect their protocols for those diseases. This may take years for each application. So if the clinic advertises that it treats everything from ALS to Parkinson’s to knee arthritis, this usually indicates that it’s not operating at a high level of credibility…. Where are the stem cells obtained? Are they from the same patient (autologous) or from an allogeneic source? Many experts agree that autologous cells are more likely to have a much more robust safety profile than cells obtained from a donor. In particular, genes of the donor remain active in the host (which could have either a potentially positive or negative impact).”
View the Article Under Discussion: http://www.faim.org/guestwriters/christophercentenovettingstemcelltherapies.html
Read More Longevity Meme Commentary: http://www.longevitymeme.org/news/
Source:Vetting Stem Cell Therapies
A new film on aging and longevity science, “To Age or Not to Age,” will be premiered in New York on February 11th, with a discussion panel of biogerontologists to follow: “The New York City screening will be followed by a live panel discussion. The panel discussion will be simulcast to venues screening the film nationwide and will stream live online. Panelists include: Dr. Robert Butler, Gerontologist, Psychiatrist & Pulitzer-Prize Winner; President and CEO of the International Longevity Center. … Dr. Aubrey de Grey, Biomedical Gerontologist; Chief Science Officer, SENS Foundation. … Dr. Leonard P. Guarente, Novartis Professor of Biology, MIT; Director, Paul F. Glenn Lab for Science of Aging. … Dr. Gordon Lithgow, Biomolecular Geneticist; Head of the Lithgow Lab, Buck Institute on Aging. Moderated by Robert Kane Pappas, director of To Age or Not to Age. The scientists featured in To Age or Not to Age have found the means to postpone and possibly mitigate diseases tied to aging, such as cancer, cardiovascular disease, neurodegenerative diseases, and diabetes.”
View the Article Under Discussion: http://www.toageornottoage.com/
Read More Longevity Meme Commentary: http://www.longevitymeme.org/news/
Promising news for sufferers of autoimmune conditions: “A researcher [has] invented a novel way to halt and even reverse rheumatoid arthritis. He developed an imitation of a suicide molecule that floats undetected into overactive immune cells responsible for the disease. … This new therapy stopped the disease cold in 75 percent of the mice. The best part was we didn’t see any toxicity. … Healthy immune cells are supposed to die after they attack an invading virus or bacteria. But in rheumatoid arthritis, the immune cells called macrophages live and go rogue. They proliferate in the blood, build up in the joints and invade cartilage and bone. Currently, there is no effective, nontoxic way to stop them. … immune cells in rheumatoid arthritis are low in a critical molecule called Bim, whose job is to order the cells to self-destruct. To correct that shortage, [researchers] developed an imitation of the molecule, called BH3 mimetic. When [injected into] mice with rheumatoid arthritis, it floated ghostlike into their macrophages and bam!, the misbehaving immune cells self destructed. … the molecule could prevent the development of rheumatoid arthritis as well as trigger a remission of existing disease. … the next step is to develop nanotechnology for a more precise method of delivering the drug.”
View the Article Under Discussion: http://www.northwestern.edu/newscenter/stories/2010/01/arthritis.html
Read More Longevity Meme Commentary: http://www.longevitymeme.org/news/
It seems simple to pop a pill for the pain, by why not avoid the side effects by trying natural possibilities first? You can turn to natural healing practices and herbs to alleviate back pain.
Here’s a report on a presentation given by biomedical gerontologist and engineered longevity advocate Aubrey de Grey in Finland: “All in all, I found the presentation very understandable, concise and even entertaining. Everything except maybe the part about the seven types of aging damage was understandable even for the layperson. If you have doubts about whether ending aging is desirable or possible, I very much recommend watching some of his lectures online. They’re also very useful if you want to convince others that the fight against aging is an important one. One thing I noticed Aubrey does well (and I don’t) is to counter arguments by people whose life philosophy is, in my opinion, grounded on bad logic. For example, he gave a good response to the religious objection that life extension is a sin, arguing that it’s essentially the other way around, because not doing anything to aging is the same thing as allowing suffering, which must be wrong. … Another important point is that unlike what people imagine their own death to be like - quick and painless - for the overwhelming majority of the world’s population it is nothing of the sort. What it is is a slow decline in physical and mental capabilities followed by a complete collapse and, ultimately, death. It is a process of slow deterioration that goes on for decades, with each decade being progressively worse in terms of biological functions than the previous one. To wish such a fate upon yourself is irrational, and to wish it upon others is just evil.”
View the Article Under Discussion: http://inhumanexperiment.blogspot.com/2010/01/aubrey-de-grey-in-helsinki-finland.html
Read More Longevity Meme Commentary: http://www.longevitymeme.org/news/
Source:Aubrey de Grey in Helsinki
An open access paper: “The notion that autophagy increases longevity is well illustrated by experiments in which the massive induction of autophagy by either pharmacological methods (such as the administration of rapamycin [Rapa] or spermidine) or genetic manipulations (like the knockdown the autophagy inhibitor p53) improves organismal survival and hence reduces age-associated mortality. Caloric restriction (which is the most physiological inducer of autophagy), Rapa (which is the best characterized pharmacological inducer of autophagy), or knockdown of the p53 ortholog cep-1, all extend the lifespan of the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans only when the autophagic machinery is intact. Thus, knockdown of AuTophaGy-related (atg) genes annihilates the longevity-enhancing effect of caloric restriction, Rapa, and p53 depletion. … Similarly, it has been found that the lifespan-extending properties of the natural polyamine spermidine strictly rely on the activation of the autophagic program in several model organisms including yeast, nematodes, and flies.”
View the Article Under Discussion: http://www.nature.com/cddis/journal/v1/n1/full/cddis20098a.html
Read More Longevity Meme Commentary: http://www.longevitymeme.org/news/