Nikki Maine and Stacey Liberatore, Dailymail.com
Updated on July 17, 2024 at 19:40 and July 17, 2024 at 19:41
Scientists are one step closer to unlocking the secrets of anti-aging.
They announced the development of a breakthrough drug that blocks the action of a protein linked to accelerated ageing, and found that the treatment extended the lifespan of rats by 25 percent.
Just 25 weeks after treatment, the animals’ cancer risk decreased, their gray hair disappeared, their eyesight improved, and their muscle function improved.
At 75 weeks of age, the animals were equivalent to 55 human years and lived an average of 155 weeks, compared with 120 weeks for untreated animals.
Humans inherited a protein called interleukin-11 from fish about 450 million years ago.
The gene has been linked to chronic inflammation, scarring of organ tissue, metabolic disorders, muscle wasting, and cardiac fibrosis.
“These findings are extremely exciting,” said co-corresponding author Professor Stuart Cook from the UK Medical Research Council’s Institute of Medical Sciences (MRC LMS).
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“Treated mice had less cancer and showed fewer of the common signs of aging and frailty, but also saw less muscle wasting and improved muscle strength.”
“In other words, the old mice that received anti-IL11 were healthier.”
“Although these findings were only obtained in mice, they raise the intriguing possibility that this drug may have similar effects in elderly humans.”
“Anti-IL-11 therapeutics are currently in clinical trials for other diseases, and there may be exciting opportunities to study their effects in older humans in the future.”
Prof Cook told the BBC that although trials were not yet complete, the data suggested the drug was safe in humans.
For their study, the team carried out two experiments and created the first genetically modified rats that lacked IL-11.
Deleting this gene extended the animals’ lifespan by an average of more than 20 percent.
However, injecting an anti-IL-11 drug blocked the protein from causing ageing-related effects in the body, with “dramatic” results.
The lifespan of both male and female rats increased by up to 25 percent.
The treatment not only prevented the loss of muscle mass and strength that occurs with chronic disease and aging, but also slowed the rate of telomere shortening.
Telomeres are the caps at the ends of each chromosome that hold the chromosomes together.
As we age, our telomeres wear down and shorten, leading to diseases such as cancer, Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s.
“Our goal is that one day anti-IL-11 therapies will be used as widely as possible, helping people around the world live longer, healthier lives,” Professor Cook said.
“But this is not easy. The approval pathway for drugs to treat aging is not clearly defined, and it is very difficult to raise funding to conduct clinical trials in this area.”
Researchers have been studying IL-11 for many years and in 2018 were the first to show that IL-11 is a pro-fibrotic and pro-inflammatory protein, overturning its long-standing mischaracterization as anti-fibrotic and anti-inflammatory.
“This project began in 2017 when our collaborators sent us tissue samples for another project,” said co-corresponding author Anissa Wijaya, assistant professor at the Duke-NUS Medical School in Singapore.
“Out of curiosity, we did some experiments looking at IL-11 levels.
“The measurements clearly showed that IL-11 levels increased with age, which got us really excited!”
“We found that these elevated levels contribute to adverse effects in the body, such as inflammation and the inhibition of organ healing and regeneration after injury.”
“Although our studies were conducted in mice, similar effects have been observed in studies of human cells and tissues, so we are hopeful that these findings will be highly relevant to human health.”
“This study is an important step towards a deeper understanding of aging, and we have demonstrated in mice a treatment that has the potential to extend healthy aging by reducing frailty and the physiological signs of aging.”
