Since many of us are old on here I thought I’d share this interesting story.

Zombie cells central to the quest for active, vital old age

Staying healthy and active in late life is a goal that eludes so many, that growing old is often associated with getting frail and sick. But scientists are trying to change that — and tackle one of humanity’s biggest challenges — through a little-known but flourishing field of aging research called cellular senescence.

It’s built upon the idea that cells eventually stop dividing and enter a “senescent” state in response to various forms of damage. The body removes most of them. But others linger like zombies. They aren’t dead. But as the Mayo Clinic’s Nathan LeBrasseur puts it, they can harm nearby cells like moldy fruit corrupting a fruit bowl. They accumulate in older bodies, which mounting evidence links to an array of age-related conditions such as dementia, cardiovascular disease, and osteoporosis.

But scientists wonder: Can the zombie cell buildup be stopped?

“The ability to understand aging — and the potential to intervene in the fundamental biology of aging — is truly the greatest opportunity we have had, maybe in history, to transform human health,” LeBrasseur says. Extending the span of healthy years impacts “quality of life, public health, socioeconomics, the whole shebang.”

With the number of people 65 or older expected to double globally by 2050, cellular senescence is “a very hot topic,” says Viviana Perez Montes of the National Institutes of Health. According to an Associated Press analysis of an NIH research database, there have been around 11,500 total projects involving cellular senescence since 1985, far more in recent years.

About 100 companies, plus academic teams, are exploring drugs to target senescent cells. And research offers tantalizing clues that people may be able to help tame senescence themselves using the strategy favored by Soller: exercise.

Full article:
[apnews.com]