For Elizabeth Parrish and the legion of scientists around the world working on methods to delay aging, genes can heal us from disease and lengthen our lives. She particularly fights against four diseases: cancer, dementia, type 2 diabetes and heart disease, but, as she explains in the conferences she gives around the world, in reality the only thing we would have to look for is the way in which our cells, instead of deteriorate over time, they will regenerate. And that is the adventure to which she has literally dedicated her life since she is, in her own words, the “guinea pig” of a new genetic treatment that is not approved in the United States yet, so it has to be move to Colombia to carry it out.
“With gene therapy we focus on certain genes that give us advantages, we inject them into our bloodstream to go to cells, where they help to produce proteins that regenerate them,” he explains. He gives the example of the mice they work with, which live an average of eight months, and in the laboratory, with optimal diet and exercise, up to 18 months. The same, with a calorie restriction regimen, allows them to live up to 30 months. But with the change in just one of their genes, these mice can double their life expectancy, without the need for diet or exercise.
We have known since the 1980s and 1990s that aging is “malleable”, thanks to the work of scientists such as Michael Class, Cynthia Kenyon and Michael Rose. Now we know the organisms called “methuselah”, which can regenerate their cells to live indefinitely. One of them is the tardigrade, which can survive such extreme conditions as freezing temperatures, boiling water, and intense radiation. “If we take a gene from this being, called a ‘damage suppressor,’ or d-sub, and inject it into human cells, they become resistant to radiation and heal faster,” explains Parrish. The mole rat is a potential source of benefactor genes, never getting cancer or developing dementia, and it lives for 20 years, while species close to it live only two or three.
Another species, astonishing as few others, is the Mexican axolotl that, if it loses a leg, is able to regenerate it completely, which also happens with its internal organs. “The most advanced regenerative medicine in the world was invented in the Jurassic,” wrote science journalist Javier Sampedro describing this amazing amphibian when it was discovered, in 2016, that studying it could “achieve reprogramming of adult cells in mice.” alive ‘, without removing them from the body ”. All these advances come from the discovery of Shin’ya Yamanaka, who won the Nobel for understanding four genes that can repair damaged human cells by taking them to their original state, that of stem cells. New advances have led to these cells being inoculated directly into living organisms, not just in the laboratory. “Can you imagine what this can mean for people with spinal injuries, brain damage, and amputations?” Parrish asks me.
Reprogramming cells “in vivo” is exactly what you are doing in your own organism, into which you inject genes researched and tested from gene banks of humans and other species (“there is a phylogenetic ‘store’ with millions of years of evolution of gene technology that we can potentially adapt to humans ”, he says). To date, he has been very successful, as he has studied his telomeres and found that they have grown, which implies a rejuvenation of part of his system. It is the technique that he intends to bring to the world, once allowed by the FDA, the food and drug agency.
María Blasco, director of the National Cancer Research Center of Madrid, explained that telomeres are structures that protect our genetic material and are essential for DNA to remain intact. How could these telomeres be rejuvenated or “lengthened”? With telomerase, which does not exist in adult cells but does exist in embryonic development, and which can now be introduced genetically into living organisms. “It is interesting that cancer cells are the only immortal that exist, and it is thanks to the fact that they keep their telomeres long,” says the also author of the book Dying Young at 140, who achieved the feat of delaying aging by 40% in mice (which remained in perfect health) using precisely telomerase, which has been called “the enzyme of immortality.”
150 years: “very modest” objective
My conversation with Liz Parrish takes place on the eve of the Singularity University Summit Mexico, which takes place every year in Puerto Vallarta, but this time it will be virtual. I ask her if she has rejuvenated since she started her treatment in 2015, and she tells me that she is now undergoing four gene therapies and, indeed, her telomeres have lengthened by an average of 5.3 more years of life for each year of therapy. . He states that this is not in all the tissues of his organism, “well we cannot do that yet”, but in the T lymphocytes and in some other cells, “but this is a gigantic advance”. “The length of telomeres is associated with all the diseases of aging, so we know that we are going in the right direction, because each of the therapies is protecting me against the effects of age.” Through his company BioViva, he continues to innovate in new gene therapies, for example against cognitive impairment, against cardiovascular diseases, liver diseases and sarcopenia.
In the future, will it be possible to rejuvenate the entire organism? My next question is, and the answer is positive: “it will be possible to develop a substance that provides multiple genes associated with cell regeneration and that essentially prevents biological aging.” It also reminds me that other research has been able to restore sight in blind people with genes taken from algae. “We can take genes from species other than human for our benefit.”
I ask her again: what exactly is going to happen in 100 years? “We are all going to have cell therapies,” he replied, “even with the genes that each individual requires, healing some organs more than others.” These therapies can be administered to young people in a preventive way, he adds, so that they do not develop diseases that later have to be cured.
I insist on asking him if we can live 150 years in perfect health, and he tells me that “that would be a very modest goal”, and that what can be achieved is for people to maintain a healthy homeostasis for as long as possible, in an almost unlimited way and in a healthy state. These gene therapies will be added to the other technologies that are already being tested and that will be ubiquitous in the future, such as nanomedicine, the generation of organs in the laboratory for transplants and the amazing CRISPR methodology, which promises to change everything and that, indeed, how so many predict, it can help us live 200 years or more in perfect health.
At this point I wonder if we will want to live that many years, and I remember another one of the superstars of anti-aging, David Sinclair, always asks his audiences if they would like to live 120 years, to which most answer no. Immediately afterwards he asks them if they would like to live 120 years in perfect health, and everyone raises their hands. As we can see, 120 healthy years is already a humble goal. Sinclair, director of the Center for the Biology of Aging, at Harvard University, discovered in his laboratory a molecule, NAD (Nicotinamide Adenide Dinucleotide), a compound present in the young organism but that reduces over time and that, he says Not only does it delay aging, it appears to reverse it. Another substance he has studied is metformin, which “is also very exciting,” he says, “because it has been seen in tens of thousands of patients to reduce the effects of aging and protect against disease.” His theory is that we can “reset” our epigenetics and thus also restore the age of our organisms, through the conversion of adult cells into stem cells, a process called Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells ”.
So are we going to choose unlimited longevity in the future? Liz Parrish comments that people generally say that they are terrified of living that long, but it is because, in saying that, “they are more philosophical than honest.” “It is understandable, society and religion influence these thoughts, but what happens when people are diagnosed with a terminal illness is that they do everything possible to stay alive. And that’s what all the public health money is spent on: people staying alive for a few months or weeks, and it’s devastating and inhuman, and people only accept death when pain and deterioration it’s already unbearable, not before. So you have to separate philosophy from reality ”.
“Imagine what it will be like in the future to undergo an intravenous drip for an hour and that this means that you never have to be operated on by opening your sternum. Think how wild that is, instead of preventing and keeping your body healthy with gene therapy that keeps arteriosclerosis under control. “
“I did not enter this business to live longer, but to cure children,” says the scientist and businesswoman, who began researching these issues when her son was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. “And in fact, each gene that we study can help with illnesses that children get. My hope is that in 100 years my company will only charge for cell enhancement therapies, which we don’t really need ”(he jokes, giving examples that some will prefer to have purple eyes or to be able to see the ultraviolet frequency). “But the therapies we do for children will be free. Within 30 years, no child should suffer from an illness ”.
My last question is when do you think the FDA will accept these treatments in the United States: “we must hurry,” he answers firmly. “One hundred thousand people die every day from potentially treatable diseases. We have cured these ailments, we have reversed aging and extended the life span of organisms in the laboratory for more than a decade, and it is outrageous to know that patients cannot yet have access to these technologies. “
International issues analyst
Planetary
José Manuel Valiñas is a columnist on international politics. He directed Inversionista magazine and is co-founder of S1ngular magazine.
Reference-www.eleconomista.com.mx