What do heart disease, stroke, Alzheimer’s, diabetes and cancer all have in common, besides being diseases that are major killers? For all of them, age is the major risk factor. That’s why an emerging trend in medicine is figuring out ways to treat the underlying cause of aging instead of the individual disease.
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The latest in that endeavor comes from aging researchers at the University of Washington, who are testing rapamycin, a drug typically used to prevent organ transplant rejection, on dogs. So far, they’ve found that the drug appears to be improving function in the dogs and extending their lives by 2 to 3 years!
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Made by a type of soil bacterium, rapamycin has already been shown to extend the life spans of yeast, flies and worms by about 25%. It’s also been tested in mice, and those results came with some exciting news. The researchers tested the drug on mice that were 20 months old — the equivalent of about 60 human years — when the trial began. They found that the longest-lived mice survived about 12% longer than the control group. That indicated that the drug could be given later in life and still be effective.
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According to the lead researcher from the dog trials, scientists are almost certain that rapamycin can slow the effects of aging in dogs as well as people. Right now, the question is whether it can slow aging with doses that don’t have significant side effects. The researchers plan to conduct further tests with the drugs that will span multiple years, and the hope is that it will be approved for humans in the next decade.
Curated article from:
NY Times
