A team of researchers claims to have discovered a protein in the brain that can act as a switch that slows down aging.
In a study recently published in Plos Biologythe team also found a way to manipulate the protein and successfully reversed age-related inflammatory processes, reported the El Confidencial.
One of the most promising techniques for reversing aging is to reduce the inflammatory processes that occur in the body as we age. Over time, our bodies lose the ability to regenerate and failures in the transmission of genetic information cause cells to stop dividing and become inactive.
These cells, known as “zombie cells”, are left to wander in our body without the immune system being able to eliminate them, causing inflammatory processes related to diseases such as Alzheimer’s, diabetes or some forms of cancer.
One of these inflammatory processes occurs in the ventromedial hypothalamus – a brain region important for learning and memory – and researchers believe it plays a key role in aging.
The team, led by Lige Leng from the Institute of Neuroscience at Xiamen University in China, found that a protein slows down inflammation in the ventromedial hypothalamus and therefore the associated aging processes.
“We speculate that, with age, the decline in protein expression in the hypothalamus may be one of the drivers of aging and that this may be the key protein that links genetic, inflammatory and metabolic factors of aging,” explained Leng.
The researchers discovered that high levels of this protein protect mice againstthinning of the skin, bone loss and memory disturbances. When levels of this neurotransmitter are low, aging is accelerated.
“The signaling of this protein in the ventromedial hypothalamus was decreased in aged rats, contributing to systemic aging phenotypes and cognitive deficits. Its effects on aging are mediated by neuroinflammatory changes and signaling of the metabolic pathway, accompanied by serine deficiency in the ventromedial hypothalamus, while protein restoration in this zone reversed age-related phenotypes,” noted Leng.
The team had already demonstrated, in a search above, that this protein in the brain of rats inhibits the inflammatory processes associated with depressive behavior.
However, treatments that work in animals don’t always work in humans, so researchers still haven’t figured out how to safely apply it.
Among other things, they need to discover protein’s exact role in aging, to better understand the process that leads to its decline, and to what extent and for how long aging can be delayed.
The discovery is yet another advance in an area that aims to provide us with an old age with less illnesses.
ZAP // 
