Life in the Fast Lane

Welcome back!

A new fountain-of-youth pill is being tested on humans by Sirtris Pharmaceuticals. It isn’t the answer to immortality, but there are claims it works to slow aging, fend off disease, and increase lifespan.

Photo Hawk684

Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de Leon never did find the fabled fountain of youth which he had heard rumors of from native Floridians in 1513. But nearly 500 years later, the myth may become reality in a pill designated SRT501.

Entrance – St. Augustine, Florida, Photo Flaurella

Ponce De Leon — Fountain of Youth in St. Augustine, Florida Photo Badthing1

Sirtris Pharmaceuticals in Cambridge, Massachusetts began testing the pill last spring in humans using 85 volunteers, in a Food and Drug Administration approved clinical trial. In August, the company announced that the drug designed to slow aging and increase lifespan is working, but it will take years of tests and trials to know if the drug will ultimately permit people to routinely live to more than 100 years, while fending off diseases of aging ranging from diabetes to cancer.

SRT501 is based on a chemical called resveratrol, found in red wine — an alcoholic beverage associated with rejuvenation. According to Harvard Professor David Sinclair, the grape skins contain the substance, which is passed on during the winemaking process to red wines.

The drug SRT501 affects a family of genes in humans and other organisms called ’sirtuins,’ which appear to control numerous advantageous functions in cells that lead to improvements in diseases ranging from obesity and diabetes to Alzheimer’s and cancer.

Photo JWinterscom

In September, Sinclair and other scientists at Sirtris and Harvard announced that they had discovered mechanisms in mice explaining how 2 of the 7 sirtuin genes in both humans and mice activate cell defenses that lead to extended lifespan in mice.

Sirtris said it would license a patent from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology — the discoverer sirtuin’s life-extending properties — that covers the actions of a gene that can slow hardening of the arteries which can lead to heart attack and stroke and other age-related diseases.

Other drugs developed by the company are entering final-stage human testing for Type 2 diabetes.

Photo Childsplayx2

Sinclair made headlines in 2005 when he published a paper in the scientific journal Nature detailing how mice on a high-fat diet were fed massive doses of resveratrol stayed as healthy as mice on a regular diet.

Resveratrol also sharply extended lifespan, produced positive changes in insulin sensitivity and other diabetes-preventing mechanisms, and increased energy production in cells.

The mice were fed very high doses of resveratrol — 22 milligrams per kilo of their weight. One liter of red wine delivers 1.5 to 3 milligrams of resveratrol. A 150 pound human would need to drink 750 to 1,500 bottles of wine a day for the same results. Sinclair claims that SRT501 is 1,000 times more potent than naturally occurring resveratrol, equaling the same potency.

Photo Bifyu

Because humans are so long-lived, SRT501 cannot be easily tested for longevity in humans. The Food and Drug Administration does not recognize ‘increased lifespan’ as an allowable indication for an approved drug, so the company is testing SRT501 for diseases related to aging, such as Type 2 diabetes. Should the drug be approved for diabetes, it will undoubtedly be used by many people without diabetes to extend lifespan.

The drug still has years of testing to go. If it works, the consequences could be overwhelming — the planet’s population could rapidly increase as death rates decline. Social Security systems and other pension programs could impact a new reasonable retirement age. But it may also mean fewer people with diabetes, Alzheimer’s, and some cancers.

Claims have been made that Sirtris has developed other compounds that are 1000 times stronger than resveratrol as well. Resveratrol is available as a dietary supplement in today’s markets.

Source: Portfolio

Random Posts

• The Night Before Christmas
• The Courier Service Trucking Industry: You Can Avoid Unsafe Shipping Practices
• Worlds Most Bizarre and Intriguing Hot Air Balloons
• Body Worlds Bizarre Real Human Specimen Exhibit
• King Tooth Pulls Train with Teeth – New World Record
• Create Your Own Heaven with Custom Made Clouds
• Nicholas Hendrickx and the Fantastic Mr Fly
• White Lion Cubs Born at French Zoo
• Mind Blowing Full Body Rollerblading Rollerman
• Sperm Made From Human Bone Marrow