In the biopharma industry, the sirtuins have been a cautionary tale of some of the challenges in translating aging research. Research in the early aughts suggested that activating them could extend lifespan, and the spectacular rise of sirtuin activators crested in 2008, when GSK plc bought preclinical startup Sirtris Pharmaceuticals Inc. to the tune of $720 million, only to shutter it a few years later. But the hopes attached to sirtuin activators have not panned out. Read more in part seven of BioWorld’s multipart series on extending the human lifespan.
If anti-aging drugs are to become widely available and adopted, especially in the U.S., they have some serious hurdles to overcome. And those hurdles aren’t all in the lab or clinic. With classes of anti-aging drugs already in the pipeline, “the biggest hurdle is FDA approval. Then reimbursement,” said George Kuchel, a professor and director of the UConn Center on Aging at the University of Connecticut. Read the final installment of BioWorld’s multipart series on extending the human lifespan.
The mosaic loss of Y chromosome in myeloid cells is a major risk factor for increased incidence of cardiovascular and fibrotic diseases during aging. The authors of a study published in the July 14, 2022, online edition of Science found that bone marrow-derived myeloid cells exhibited mLOY during aging.
Using long-term in vivo imaging combined with computational modeling, a multinational team of researchers has gained new insights into what makes potential stem cells able to fulfill their role functionally.
Researchers have discovered how the tau protein turns from a normal to a disease state in Alzheimer's disease (AD) and have shown how the discovery could potentially deliver a therapeutic target.
Several genetic studies in a range of model organisms have pointed to an important role for the B-cell lymphoma 2 (BCL2)-associated athanogene 3 (BAG3) gene in the maintenance of cardiac function.
Research carried out by a team at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in Memphis highlights the importance of carefully assessing the mouse model you plan to use before starting preclinical medical research.
No matter how they come about, functional impairments in the DNA repair protein BRCA1 will hamper cells' ability to repair their genome, and increase the chances that a cell will become cancerous. However, researchers from the Jackson Laboratory for Genomic Medicine reported in the July 6, 2022, issue of ScienceTranslationalMedicine that reduced BRCA1 activity that was due to methylation of its promoter differed from BRCA1 mutation in terms of its response to platinum chemotherapy.
SARS-CoV-2 infection caused damage to brain blood vessels via a cascade of immune system reactions that was most likely initiated by antibody-dependent cytotoxicity, researchers from the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke reported in the July 5, 2022, online issue of Brain.