’Reverse Ageing’ -- Discovery Made by University of NSW
A discovery that could lead to a revolutionary drug that actually reverses ageing?
University of New South Wales (UNSW) researchers have made a
discovery that could lead to a revolutionary drug that actually reverses
ageing, improves DNA repair and could even help NASA get its astronauts to
Mars.
In a paper published in Science today, the team identifies a critical
step in the molecular process that allows cells to repair damaged DNA.
Their
experiments in mice suggest a treatment is possible for DNA damage from ageing
and radiation. It is so promising it has attracted the attention of NASA, which
believes the treatment can help its Mars mission.
While
our cells have an innate capability to repair DNA damage—which happens every
time we go out into the sun, for example - their ability to do this declines as
we age.
The
scientists identified that the metabolite NAD+, which is naturally present in
every cell of our body, has a key role as a regulator in protein-to-protein
interactions that control DNA repair.
Treating
mice with a NAD+ precursor, or "booster," called NMN improved their
cells' ability to repair DNA damage caused by radiation exposure or old age.
"The
cells of the old mice were indistinguishable from the young mice, after just
one week of treatment," said lead author Professor David Sinclair of UNSW
School of Medical Sciences and Harvard Medical School Boston.
Human
trials of NMN therapy will begin within six months.
"This
is the closest we are to a safe and effective anti-ageing drug that's perhaps
only three to five years away from being on the market if the trials go
well," says Sinclair, who maintains a lab at UNSW in Sydney.
What
it means for astronauts, childhood cancer survivors, and the
rest of us:
The
work has excited NASA, which is considering the challenge of keeping its
astronauts healthy during a four-year mission to Mars.
Even
on short missions, astronauts experience accelerated ageing from cosmic radiation, suffering from
muscle weakness, memory loss and other symptoms when they return. On a trip to Mars, the situation would be far
worse: five per cent of the astronauts' cells would die and their chances of
cancer would approach 100 per cent.
Professor
Sinclair and his UNSW colleague Dr. Lindsay Wu were winners in NASA's iTech
competition in December last year.
"We
came in with a solution for a biological problem and it won the competition out
of 300 entries," Dr. Wu says.
Professor David Sinclair and his UNSW team. Credit: Britta
Campion
Cosmic
radiation is not only an issue for astronauts. We're all exposed to it aboard aircraft, with
a London-Singapore-Melbourne flight roughly equivalent in radiation to a chest
x-ray.
In
theory, the same treatment could mitigate any effects of DNA damage for
frequent flyers. The other group that could benefit from this work is survivors
of childhood cancers.
Dr.
Wu says 96 per cent of childhood cancer survivors suffer a chronic illness by
age 45, including cardiovascular disease, Type 2 diabetes, Alzheimer's disease,
and cancers unrelated to the original cancer.
"All
of this adds up to the fact they have accelerated ageing, which is
devastating," he says.
"It
would be great to do something about that, and we believe we can with this
molecule."
An
anti-ageing pill could be on the horizon:
For
the past four years, Professor Sinclair and Dr. Wu have been working on making
NMN into a drug substance with their companies MetroBiotech NSW and
MetroBiotech International.
The
human trials will begin this year at Brigham and Women's Hospital, in Boston.
The
findings on NAD+ and NMN add momentum to the exciting work the UNSW Laboratory
for Ageing Research has done over the past four years.
They've
been looking at the interplay of a number of proteins and molecules and their
roles in the ageing process.
They
had already established that NAD+ could be useful for treating various diseases
of ageing, female infertility and also treating side effects of chemotherapy.
In
2003, Professor Sinclair made a link between the anti-ageing enzyme SIRT1 and
resveratrol, a naturally occurring molecule found in tiny quantities in red
wine.
"While
resveratrol activates SIRT1 alone, NAD+ boosters activate all seven sirtuins,
SIRT1-7, and should have an even greater impact on health and longevity,"
he says.
Source: University
of New South Wales -- Professor David Sinclair.
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