SINCE ancient times, human beings have yearned to live longer and remain young forever. No wonder there are many mythological stories of those aspiring to immortality and eternal youth.
For instance, in Greek mythology we find the story of Eos, the goddess of dawn, who fell in love with the Trojan prince Tithonus, a mortal being. Eos, therefore, asked Zeus to grant Tithonus the gift of immortality, but forgot to ask for eternal youth. Tithonus aged with time without dying, and the gift of immortality turned into a curse.
Similarly, Apollo granted the Cumaean Sibyl priestess from Roman times the gift to live for a thousand years, but after she refused the god’s love, he allowed her to wither away until her body was kept in a jar because she did not ask for eternal youth.
In modern times, human beings still long for immortality. People have spent millions on cryostasis, the transfusion of young people’s blood plasma, storing stem cells, or attempting to upload human consciousness into a surrogate robotic body.
Humans still seek everlasting youth. Recognising this psychological desire, many cosmetic brands offer a myriad solutions – from hair dyeing products to anti-wrinkle creams – even though what they offer only makes people feel younger.
This quest for everlasting youth has sparked significant commercial interest over the past few years, including interest from companies such as Human Longevity, Google Galico, Altos Labs, Elysium Health, as well as from billionaires such as Jeff Bezos (Amazon), Pieter Thiel (Paypal co-founder), Larry Ellison (Oracle), and Marc Zuckerberg (Facebook). New promising drugs, such as senolytics, are being developed to counter the underlying biological causes of ageing and the risk of developing cancer, Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s and other age-related diseases.
A few days ago, researchers from the University of Cambridge’s Babraham Institute published their research in the eLife scientific journal describing their success in the rejuvenation of a 53-year-old woman’s skin cells to the equivalent of a 23-year-old woman’s skin appearance. The major breakthrough is that they could demonstrate,, for the first time that cell rejuvenation is possible.
The techniques used built on those used to create the famous cloned sheep, Dolly, in the 1990s, when researchers developed a method of turning an adult mammary gland cell of a sheep into an embryo. In 2006, Professor Shinya Yamanaka developed induced pluripotent stem cells (iPS), involving the adding of chemicals to adult cells for around 50 days, resulting in genetic changes that turned the adult cells into stem cells.
Prof Wolf Reik and his team from Cambridge used this iPS technique on the 53-year-old skin cells, but shortened the chemical bath to 12 days. Interestingly, the cells had not turned into embryonic stem cells, but had rejuvenated into skin cells that looked and behaved as if they came from a 23-year old. They have thus overcome the issue of entirely erasing cell identity and function.
The exciting prospect is that the Cambridge scientists believe that their cell reprogramming would be able in future to rejuvenate other tissues in the body (muscles, liver and blood cells). The aim is to keep people healthier as they grow older, since the ability of cells to function properly declines. This is one of the reasons why many diseases get worse with age. The focus of the Cambridge team is thus more on health span than lifespan.
The breakthrough finding of cell rejuvenation opens up many exciting possibilities. The researchers found that rejuvenated skin cells move much faster in experiments simulating wounds. It could thus possibly be used in future to rejuvenate skin in the case of cuts and burns, and could accelerate the healing process.
The researchers also found a reverse of ageing indicators in genes associated with diseases, which opens up many new treatment possibilities. If immune cells could be rejuvenated through new therapies, which become less responsive with age, it could in future be possible to boost older people’s response to vaccinations and to fight infections.
According to Reik, future research could even lead to a method of whole-body regeneration such as anti-ageing pills. According to him, the same technique has been applied to genetically-modified mice and obtained some signs of rejuvenation. One exciting study found signs of a rejuvenated pancreas, which would be life-changing for diabetics.
However, the research is still in an early stage and it will take time before it will move from the lab into the clinic. There are still many scientific hurdles to overcome, such as that the iPS method increases the risk of cancers. However difficult, a safer method must be found by the researchers. Cells other than skin cells may also require different conditions that are not so easy to control. Safe, whole body rejuvenation would be even more difficult and is at best still a dream.
The findings of the Cambridge team are exiting and could revolutionise regenerative medicine, as until now scientists were not able to create conditions to re-differentiate stem cells. There is no doubt that if successful, it could improve our health as we become older. But one thing is for sure. Rejuvenation is, and will be in the near future, only for the rich.
Professor Louis C H Fourie is an extraordinary professor at the University of the Western Cape
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