First glimpse of end-of chromosome repair in real time

Researchers have developed a first-of-its- kind system to observe repair to broken DNA in newly synthesized telomeres, an effort which has implications for designing new cancer drugs. Penn Study Describes Mechanism of Chromosome Maintenance that Drives 15 Percent of Cancers PHILADELPHIA — Maintaining the ends of chromosomes, called telomeres, allows cells to continuously divide and…

Ovaries may hold the secret for holding back ageing in females.

As we age, our metabolism slows and our immune system runs out of steam. Older people are more likely to have severe cold and flu symptoms, probably because they have fewer fresh immune cells left. And a slower metabolism means that glucose stays in the blood stream for longer after eating a meal. Over time,…

Alzheimer’s disease could be treated with gene therapy, suggests animal study

Researchers have prevented the development of Alzheimer’s disease in mice by using a virus to deliver a specific gene into the brain. The early-stage findings, by scientists from Imperial College London, open avenues for potential new treatments for the disease. In the study, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the…

Anti-aging Rapamycin drug update

CNN explores the decade of research on Rapamycin and its potential as anti-aging drug. It has been administered to dogs with good results and to a small number of human subjects. “It’s been remarkable,” Paola Anderson said as she watched Momo, her 13-year-old white Pomsky, run around the backyard, keeping up with dogs a third…

Speeding Up Muscle Repair

Stem cells, is there anything they can’t do? As you get older your muscles deteriorate. Now scientists are finding improved muscle health after using stem cells. Athletes, the elderly and those with degenerative muscle disease would all benefit from accelerated muscle repair. When skeletal muscles, those connected to the bone, are injured, muscle stem cells…

Brain Cells Death: We May Know Why It Happens

BRAIN CELL ‘EXECUTIONER’ IDENTIFIED. Common culprit may cause damage in stroke, brain injury, neurodegenerative disease. Despite their different triggers, the same molecular chain of events appears to be responsible for brain cell death from strokes, injuries and even such neurodegenerative diseases as Alzheimer’s. Now, researchers at Johns Hopkins say they have pinpointed the protein at…

Limit to human life may be 115 (ish)

Human life spans may be limited to a maximum of about 115 years, claim US scientists. Their conclusions, published in the journal Nature, were made by analysing decades of data on human longevity. They said a rare few may live longer, but the odds were so poor you’d have to scour 10,000 planet Earths to…

As tech trickles in, medicine is about to hit warp speed

Digital Trends explores the near future trends in medicine and how what technology did to postal mail, CD music, newspapers and video is coming for medicine next. Now, instead of just puzzling over complex medical questions with our limited human brainpower, we’ve begun enlisting the help of machines to analyze vast amounts of data, recognize…

More Progress in Defeating Alzheimer’s

Alzheimer’s is a terrible disease. If we do not solve its mysteries, 13.5 million Americans are forecast to get the disease by 2050. What is less often talked about, is the impact on the families of the victims. For every person with the sickness, there are family members who suffer along with them, watching their…

Parabiosis: rejuvention by young blood

Read up on how young blood apparently rejuvenates older blood. While interpretations were often simplified and no, young blood can’t make you live forever, there has been a number of findings over the last decade around the power of blood that have significant implications for human health and the ageing process. More at TheLong+Short here:…

Chan Zuckerberg Initiative commits to investing $3 billion to cure diseases

The philanthropic initiative founded by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan, will spend $3 billion over the next decade in an effort to cure and manage all human diseases. The Chan Zuckerberg’s latest effort will begin with a $600 million investment in a project called Biohub, an independent research center located at…

Fighting the aging process at a cellular level

It was about 400 BC when Hippocrates astutely observed that gluttony and early death seemed to go hand in hand. Too much food appeared to ‘extinguish’ life in much the same way as putting too much wood on a fire smothers its flames. If obesity led to disease and death, he thought, then perhaps restraint…