The Secret to Longevity is Within Us

Healthy Aging

Searching Our Metabolome for Age-Delaying Molecules

In the Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, DeVito et al. summarize the outcomes of a symposium on geroscience and geroprotectors (aka aging science and anti-aging therapeutics). For this series, we’re sharing the latest and greatest thoughts on how to discover holy grail geroprotectors that could meaningfully delay aging to improve our healthspan and longevity.

Wait, where did we leave off last week?

Over the last couple of weeks, we covered how geroprotectors could delay aging and how ongoing clinical trials can inform us if a molecule works. The current leaderboard of potential age-defying molecules includes:

• Rapamycin
• Metformin
• Acarbose
• Aspirin
• 17-a-estradiol
• Nordihydroguaiaretic acid (NDGA)

While this impressive list has been whittled down from thousands of anti-aging candidates, they all have limitations. Most are prescription-only drugs (rapamycin, metformin, acarbose). Some have safety issues (aspirin and nordihydroguaiaretic acid) or are not available for human use (17-a-estradiol). As such, the search for the “perfect” geroprotector continues.

The promise (and weirdness) of young blood

While the drugs above were discovered from Easter Island bacteria, the French lilac, willow bark, or the creosote bush, the best and safest healthy aging molecules may, in fact, already exist within us.

This is the foundation of ‘young blood’ studies, which started by simply infusing blood from young mice into old mice. While this may sound archaic, a series of studies showed that, by routinely doing so, old mice had improved memory, restored learning, and improved muscle function. Old male mice even had restored fertility with rejuvenated sperm counts. These studies support that, if one could be repeatedly infused with young blood, one could remain youthful.

This all starts getting a bit weird, right? Harnessing young blood and infusing it into us older folks. In his commentary, Hoffman asks us to pause before we all become vampires.

Harnessing our longevity super powers

While continuously infusing young blood is not the likely solution to help us all live healthier longer, these studies do support that there’s something in blood that supports a youthful state.

In fact, blood contains thousands of small molecules, all serving different functions to keep us healthy and well balanced. Combined, these molecules constitute our metabolome. Our metabolome can directly determine our health, including how fast our bodies biologically age. Thus, we can use metabolomics – the study of small molecules in our bodies – to figure out which molecules in young blood can help us stay, well – young.