Variation in CpG Methylation is Tied to Biological AgingOctober 19, 2016There aren’t many things in this world that we can be certain about, but aging marks an all too important exception. Towards the goal of understanding the marks of this unavoidable process, we’ve seen the epigenetic clock, which looks at CpG sites that are certainly differentially methylated as we age. However, a new perspective to […]
Meta-Analysis Reveals Grim Reaper is Keeping an Eye On Your Epigenetic ClockOctober 19, 2016They say ‘Seasons don’t fear the reaper’, and while the festivities of this season certainly favor the reaper, most of us dread the reaper’s favor. Our understanding of how to avoid that favor is now improving, thanks to some new insight from the epigenetic clock-watching lab of Steve Horvath at UCLA. The epigenetic clock consists […]
Proteomic Analysis of Aging MSCs Reveals New Targets to Enhance Musculoskeletal TherapiesSeptember 27, 2016Mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) are surely the “workhorses” of both the body and the regenerative medicine field. They display multiple advantageous characteristics, including the ability to differentiate into musculoskeletal tissues, that make MSCs the go-to cell type for tissue-engineering solutions for disease/age-related disorders. Furthermore, many tissues require the proper on-going function of tissue-resident MSCs to […]
Age, Sequence, and DNA Methylation are Culprits of Lactose IntoleranceMay 20, 2016While fine wine and aged cheese are culinary delights, some of us who dine on dairy often start to go a bit ‘sour’ with age and develop lactose intolerance. Thankfully, to aid our mental digestion of such a foul fate, a collaborative effort between Toronto and Lithuania has shown the molecular mechanism of why we can […]
Stress Accelerates Epigenetic AgeingDecember 18, 2015The epigenetic clock has developed faster than the iWatch: it can predict biological age from select CpGs, which when compared with chronological age, gives a metric known as Δ-age. The greater the difference, the greater the acceleration of epigenetic age, which indicates variation in the rate of senescence between people. To understand this variation and […]
Stem Cell Scientists Use Cell Reprogramming Techniques to Study AgingOctober 22, 2015“Work harder, eat less, and, I’m begging you, get a haircut!” A face-to-face meeting between a younger and an older version of yourself would surely be filled with sage advice on how to live life and grow old gracefully. Many scientists wish to recreate such a meeting between young and old neurons to study aging and […]
Sorting the Old from the New – Cellular Barriers Keeps Stem Cells YoungSeptember 29, 2015Alongside smartphones, coffee shops, and bars, we all also need properly functioning stem cells to survive and prosper. Indeed, the stem cell theory of aging posits that the malfunctioning of stem cells in our later years, and not all that caffeine and alcohol, is the major cause of human aging. So how do we keep […]
Nukes Aid Stem Cell Research in the HeartJune 20, 2015Researchers from the laboratory of Jonas Frisén at the Karolinska Institutet in Sweden have recently put radioactive carbon from nuclear bomb tests to good use, testing whether the adult human heart has the ability to repair itself. So how does that work? Well, a sharp rise in atmospheric radioactive carbon in the 1950-60s due to […]
Could Chromatin Organization be the Key to Eternal Youth?May 13, 2015For thousands of years great men such as Alexander the Great and Ponce de León have searched far and wide in their search for the fountain of youth and the hope of eternal life. But where they previously failed, an enterprising group of scientists may have now just succeeded! A report published recently in Science […]
Epigenetic Clock Goes from Analog to iWatchFebruary 6, 2015Tick tock…we all know that life is a battle against the inevitability of time. But wouldn’t it be great if you could get a real idea of how your cells are aging? It may just help make 20 the new 30, that is when it comes to your chance of death. And that’s the ambitious […]
