An unprecedented breakthrough in stem cell research may hold the key to combating a terrible disease and unlocking the gate to immortality…

• In the process of working with a new type of cell—induced pluripotent stem cells, a stem cell similar to embryonic stem cells but made from ordinary skin cells—a team of researchers at the Children’s Hospital Boston and the Harvard Stem Cell Institute were able to reverse the aging process of a rare genetic disease.
• The disease, dyskeratosis congenita, is a blood marrow disorder that causes premature aging, warped fingernails (among other symptoms) and an increased risk of cancer. In the process of creating iPS cells from diseased patients’ skin cells, the scientists found that a gene in the cells multiplied three-fold, helping to restore telomeres (little caps on the ends of the chromosomes that carry DNA), which are integral in the process of aging and death in cells. Replenishing the telomeres could, in theory, help reverse the aging process.
• About half of the people with the disease have bone marrow failure (meaning that their bone marrow stops making blood and immune cells properly), and of those people, many often die during bone marrow transplants. However, researchers think that bone marrow transplants from a patient’s own cells may be a gentler process.

Facts & Figures

• Dyskeratosis congenita is a very rare disease and is usually diagnosed between the ages of 10 and 30.
• In dyskeratosis congenita, the cells lose telomerase, an enzyme that helps maintain the telomeres. As telomeres deteriorate, cells age, and disease and death follow.
• In cancer, telomerase apparently helps tumor cells become immortal and proliferate. Experimental cancer drugs target telomerase.
• TERC helps rejuvenate telomeres, and researchers suspect that tumor cells employ TERC in order to achieve immortality.
• Researchers speculate that replenishing TERC might help the sufferers of dsykeratosis congenita.

Best Quote

“We’re not saying we’ve found the fountain of youth, but the process of creating iPS cells recapitulates some of the biology that our species uses to rejuvenate itself in each generation.” – Suneet Agarwal, Researcher at Harvard Stem Cell Institute

Tags: rare diseases, science, stem cell research