Considering Klotho Delivery as a Means to Reduce Age-Related Stem Cell Decline

Today I'll point out an open access paper on the longevity-related gene klotho. Some researchers see therapies to adjust levels of the klotho protein produced from this genetic blueprint as a possible way to slow some of the effects of aging, particularly those connected to regeneration and stem cell activity. Work on this is slow-moving and painstaking, as for any similar approaches. Yet a fairly large section of the medical research community is now devoted to at least partial and temporary restoration of tissue maintenance by stem cells in the old. A good fraction of the frailty and failure of aging results not just from direct damage such as cross-links in the extracellular matrix and broken mitochondria run amok, but also from the lack of repair of tissues, the faltering of the supply of new cells produced by stem cells in order to replace the old. Stem cell transplants are only the earliest and most direct way to try to temporarily boost regeneration and maintenance. In recent years many other possibilities have blossomed, these approaches involving the adjustment of specific biochemical signals so as to instruct native cells to return to work. Where researchers have determined what happens to stem cell populations in the old, which is by no means a finished process given the wide range of tissue types still to be investigated fully, it seems that for the most part stem cells are neither missing nor critically impaired, but rather quiescent, simply inactive. This quie...
Source: Fight Aging! - Category: Research Authors: Tags: Medicine, Biotech, Research Source Type: blogs