An Energetic Exploration of the Biochemistry of Cellular Senescence is Underway

In 2011 a research group published the results from an animal study that demonstrated, in a way that couldn't be ignored, that the accumulation of senescent cells is a significant cause of aging and age-related disease. In fact, the evidence for this to be the case had been compelling for a very long time - this demonstration came nearly a decade after Aubrey de Grey, on the basis of the existing evidence at the time, included cellular senescence as one of the causes of aging in the first published version of his SENS research proposals. Yet nothing had been done to move ahead and achieve something with this knowledge. That did not change until researchers obtained sufficient philanthropic funding to run the 2011 animal study, using a sophisticated genetic mechanism that eliminated senescent cells as they formed. From that point on, a slow-moving avalanche of interest and funding fell into this part of the field of aging research. All of the groups with an existing interest in cellular senescence, and that had previously struggled to raise sufficient resources to make progress, could now move rapidly. With the aim of selectively destroying senescent cells to reverse aspects of aging, small molecule senolytic pharmaceuticals and then other methods such as gene therapies and immunotherapies were discovered or constructed. Today there are at least a dozen such small molecule drugs, published and in the works, and a handful of increasingly well-funded startup biotech compa...
Source: Fight Aging! - Category: Research Authors: Tags: Medicine, Biotech, Research Source Type: blogs