
Destroying worn-out cells makes mice live longer - Someone
http://www.nature.com/news/destroying-worn-out-cells-makes-mice-live-longer-1.19287
======
espeed
Fasting destroys worn-out cells and replaces them with stem cells:

[https://news.usc.edu/63669/fasting-triggers-stem-cell-
regene...](https://news.usc.edu/63669/fasting-triggers-stem-cell-regeneration-
of-damaged-old-immune-system/)

[https://news.usc.edu/82959/diet-that-mimics-fasting-
appears-...](https://news.usc.edu/82959/diet-that-mimics-fasting-appears-to-
slow-aging/)

~~~
feelix
Right, but isn't this only referring killing old immune system cells, but the
treatment in this article is referring killing old cells throughout the entire
body?

------
Gatsky
Note: [http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-
free/pdf?res=9C07E5DF1F...](http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-
free/pdf?res=9C07E5DF1F3EE733A25755C2A9619C946797D6CF)

Journalistic reporting of 'miraculous' pre-clinical results hasn't changed
much in 100 years it seems. Of course, we aren't using trypsin to treat cancer
today.

Nevertheless, we should be optimistic, we live during a golden age for the
life sciences.

What I find disappointing is that this work has been spirited away to a VC
funded private company. At best they will fail, at worst they will stop others
from making progress.

~~~
jostmey
Private funding is great for engineering projects. But it is only useful in
scientific endeavors when the scientist can talk with the academic community
openly.

------
purplerabbit
I'm emotionally putting it under "amazing studies whose implications will
likely never be realized", but I digress: this is literally awesome.

~~~
esturk
Never is a long time. Maybe we won't benefit, but our children may.

~~~
toomuchtodo
I'm 33. I'm confident I'll be able to live long enough to benefit, if only
because I'm willing to try something experimental.

"Go big or go home" as it were. What's my other choice? Death? Nothing but
upside.

~~~
ISL
The alternative for many choices in life can be worse than death.

A new drug that harms your nervous system or starts an auto-immune disorder
could be a real bummer.

~~~
toomuchtodo
I'm prepared to live with (or not) the consequences of any genomic self-
hacking I undertake.

~~~
adrianN
You should probably freeze some eggs/sperm before you start messing up your
genome. If you end up with some weird illness, at least your children won't
get it.

~~~
toomuchtodo
Already done. Excellent suggestion though.

------
nonbel
>"Investigators were blinded to allocation during experiments and outcome
assessment, except for rare instances where blinding was not possible."

Not saying this should mar the study or anything, but I wonder what that could
mean.

Edit: It appears I spoke too soon and this does mar the study. I thought they
always waited for natural death, but no:

"mice were injected twice a week with AP or vehicle until they became moribund
or died of natural causes."

They don't explain the methods or data (how many, etc) regarding these
moribund mice anywhere either. The lack of effective blinding procedures
combined with this undefined "moribund" state is actually a huge red flag.

------
suprgeek
I think the biggest bit of positive news in this fascinating study is
mentioned just in passing...that the treated mice "developed Cancer later".

In a lot of Aging related research tinkering, very often there are steep costs
to improving life-spans - increased rates of Cancer. See anytime you mess with
the reason a Cell lives or dies due to ageing, you are risking higher Cancer
rates. The fact that this treatment both improves life-spans and "delays
cancer" is indeed very promising. Now hopefully the transmission pathways hold
true in Humans...

~~~
nonbel
People also report ~2x differences in tumor death rates due to weird stuff
like cage row though: "a strong correlation between cage row and RE (reticulo-
endothelial tumor) death rates, which varied from 17% (bottom row) to 32% (top
row) (table 2)."
[http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/6935460](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/6935460)

Doesn't look like they controlled for that in the current paper. Who knows? In
the extended figures they report a huge variation in median lifespan between
different labs (like 33%, corresponding to what would be differences of 25-30
years for humans). It could have something to do with closeness to the door,
air circulation, etc that people aren't thinking about.

Maybe rodents gain some health benefit from being nearer the ground. Less
stress when they look out the window?

------
adenadel
Nature also has another editorial that goes into the details a bit more.[0] As
well, here is the study of interest.[1]

0\.
[http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/natu...](http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nature16875.html)

1\.
[http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/natu...](http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nature16932.html)

~~~
gwern
Editorial and paper:
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/bl2inz7eyrchsre/2016-gil.pdf](https://www.dropbox.com/s/bl2inz7eyrchsre/2016-gil.pdf)
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/cpgfw89wq852imq/2016-baker.pdf](https://www.dropbox.com/s/cpgfw89wq852imq/2016-baker.pdf)

~~~
adenadel
Interesting, I don't think that they were behind a paywall when I first posted
them. Certainly the editorial wasn't, or I wouldn't have been able to read it.

------
reasonattlm
The company founded for this is Union Biotechnology; they wouldn't be getting
VC money if they were more than a couple years away from human trials. Indeed,
the CEO is on record in some of the present press as saying two years.

[http://finance.yahoo.com/news/unity-biotechnology-
launches-f...](http://finance.yahoo.com/news/unity-biotechnology-launches-
focus-preventing-180300392.html)

The technology being used here in mice is not suitable for humans in its
present form. But it won't take much tinkering to make it so - this is an age
of gene therapy. The most important things here are that:

(a) a robust life extension was achieved with a SENS approach of damage
repair, something that SENS advocates have been working towards for more than
a decade. The SENS view is right. It is right today, as demonstrated, and it
was right ten years ago when people were lining up to deride it. A SENS
technology has produced a robust life extension and remediation of age-related
diseases across the board in normal mice. People who think that SENS and
damage repair are not the way forward need to take a long, serious look at why
they think that, and then revisit the science.

(b) The Union Biotech VC and university PR machines are putting out word for
word the SENS vision of damage repair to treat aging. SENS has won. This is
the dawn of the age of rejuvenation biotechnology, with a near future of
widespread support for that goal.

(c) There are at least three methods of clearing senescent cells in mammals,
and most likely four. (1) The method of Oisin Biotechnology, seed funded last
year by Methuselah Foundation and SENS Research Foundation, (2) the senolytic
drug combination demonstrated last year, (3) the capase/gene trigger work
linked here, and (4) the adaptation of method #3 currently underway at Union
Biotechnology.

To be clear, half of these methods work in mammals now. If you had the right
connections you could use them today. Clinical availability will not be a long
time in coming, and I for one hope to see this escape the regulatory gauntlet
very rapidly and get into medical tourism and clinics worldwide just like stem
cell therapies did at the turn of the century.

Finally a note for investors and business people: every SENS rejuvenation
technology of this ilk has a target market of every human being on the planet
over the age of 30. Everyone, with treatments once every decade at a minimum.
This is medicine that will make blockbuster drugs of past years look like damp
squibs. That is why this should and will escape the narrow regulatory gauntlet
that will try to restrict use to old people with the late stage of a few
specific illnesses. That is nonsense and no way to run the future - senescent
cells should be periodically cleared every few years starting at 30.

~~~
timrpeterson
Ahh, can't have a HN thread on aging without mention of SENS. Is this a bot?

~~~
Jach
SENS is if anything under-mentioned. Not only everywhere but I get the feeling
on HN too. For fun, I did a google search on this site for "aging" and looked
at the first page of results, 3/7 relevant threads make mention of SENS, and
most of the 7 are kind of old threads. In order, with the first three
mentioning SENS:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8838073](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8838073)
(394 days)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9592378](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9592378)
(256 days)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6406084](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6406084)
(868 days)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9844909](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9844909)
(211 days)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8727314](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8727314)
(420 days)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10468025](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10468025)
(98 days)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9613206](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9613206)
(252 days)

------
keyle
Is this the cure to cancer? Honestly, at the basics, isn't cancer cells
turning against us because they're degenerated?

Also this song popped in my head... of course...
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1foeTSHrgiU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1foeTSHrgiU)

------
tomcam
I'm all for destroying my many, many worn-out fat cells. Many.

~~~
echaozh
Fat cells are not worn out. When they wear out, they're gone. I guess.

~~~
DrScump
The cells can remain when the lipid contents are depleted. One feature request
of mine is triggering apoptosis for empty fat cells.

~~~
danieltillett
This was developed more than 30 years ago by the CISRO here in Australia. What
they did is made antibodies against fat cells surface proteins. When injected
into an animal the animal lost the fat cells all over their body if injected
into a vein and just locally if inject into fat tissue.

I don’t know whatever came of the technology, but I always thought it would be
very popular if applied to humans.

~~~
DrScump
Would you please sneak me a case? And maybe a Darrel Lea SF chocolate bar or
two?

But seriously, if it was viable and productizable, somebody would make a mint.
Lipo in a syringe?!

~~~
adrianN
Killing lots of cells at once is a recipe for trouble. Your body's clean up
mechanisms are overwhelmed and you die, basically.

~~~
danieltillett
This is true, but you can control this by controlling the dose or using
locally.

------
ekianjo
As usual this kind of articles has no info on base size, effect size and
whether the findings are totally significant or not. Science reporting at its
best.

~~~
cfcef
No effect size?

> Mice whose senescent cells were killed off over six months were healthier,
> in several ways, than a control group of transgenic mice in which these
> cells were allowed to build up. Their kidneys worked better and their hearts
> were more resilient to stress, they tended to explore their cages more and
> they developed cancers at a later age. Eliminating senescent cells also
> extended the lifespans of the mice by 20–30%, Baker and van Deursen report
> in Nature on 3 February.

------
malloryerik
Sign me up for immortality.

