2023-11-17 03:02:50
Updated Friday, November 17, 2023 – 02:02
Researchers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences have identified cells that promote senescence in spinal cord motor neurons and how to counteract this effect
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Aging is a critical factor in disorders associated with the spinal cord, especially in relation to motor neurons, which regulate daily and essential activities, such as walking, speaking or swallowing, among many others.
A team of researchers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, in Beijing, has identified in an experimental model of non-human primates a group of cells that are close to aging motor neurons and that are differentiated by a specific biomarker. The results are published in Nature.
Using a single-cell resolution analysis of the spinal cord of some macaques with advanced age (17 to 18 years)scientists have observed that these cells express a high level of the factor chitotriosidase-1 (CHIT1), a driver of motor neuron aging.
The researchers, led by Guang-Hui Luiprofessor at the Institute of Regeneration and Stem Cells, at the Institute of Zoology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, have also shown that the prosenescent effects of the CH1T1 factor can be attenuated by vitamin C.
Vitamin C at breakfast
“We have shown that CHIT1 acts as a driver of motor neuron aging, and its pro-senescence effects can be counteracted by the geroprotective compound ascorbic acid. [vitamina C]”, they write in Nature.
This possibility of intervention was tested experimentally by dividing the ten macaques studied randomly into two groups: five of the animals received breakfast a dose of 30 mg per kg of ascorbic acid dissolved in water for 40 months. While the other group received a similar amount of water without the vitamin also in the morning.
The analysis of their samples revealed an improvement in different indicators associated with the aging of motor neurons, which is detailed in the work, suggesting a potential benefit of the supplement.
“Our findings provide the single-cell resolution cellular and molecular landscape of the aging primate spinal cord and identify a new biomarker and intervention target for spinal cord degeneration. Overall, these insights offer a potential basis for interventions targeting diseases related to aging in multiple physiological systems, with the goal of improving the general health of the aging human population,” these scientists explain.
“Logarithmic growth,” says Izpisúa
One of the authors of the work is the Spanish scientist Juan Carlos Izpisúascientific founder and director of the Altos laboratory, in San Diego (California), who highlights that the observations have been made in non-human primates, a model much closer to the human being than the classic rodent patterns and, therefore, most relevant to understand and design intervention strategies in the aging process.
“The translation to the human clinic of the knowledge that is being generated in basic research laboratories is going to experience a logarithmic growth in the coming years, thanks to the use of different primate models,” the scientist advances in an email. He then recalls the recently published research that has generated a chimeric monkey, one of whose most interesting potential applications would be to serve “as a model for study human diseases.
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