Lifeboat Foundation

Nootropics or “Smart Drugs” have been credited with enhancing cognitive functions, including creativity. We dug into the research to find out if they really do.

The cerebellum can’t get no respect. Located inconveniently on the underside of the brain and initially thought to be limited to controlling movement, the cerebellum has long been treated like an afterthought by researchers studying higher brain functions.

But researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis say overlooking the cerebellum is a mistake. Their findings, published Oct. 25 in Neuron, suggest that the cerebellum has a hand in every aspect of higher brain functions — not just movement, but attention, thinking, planning and decision-making.

“The biggest surprise to me was the discovery that 80 percent of the cerebellum is devoted to the smart stuff,” said senior author Nico Dosenbach, MD, PhD, an assistant professor of neurology, of occupational therapy and of pediatrics. “Everyone thought the cerebellum was about movement. If your cerebellum is damaged, you can’t move smoothly ­— your hand jerks around when you try to reach for something. Our research strongly suggests that just as the cerebellum serves as a quality check on movement, it also checks your thoughts as well — smoothing them out, correcting them, perfecting things.”

Drugs that target multiple aging pathways at once significantly extend the healthspan and lifespan of nematodes.

In a paper published in Developmental Cell, scientists from Yale University have demonstrated how targeting multiple pathways related to aging with different drug combinations can slow aging down and extend healthy lifespan in C. elegans [1].

Abstract

Continue reading “Treating Multiple Aging Pathways Simultaneously Extends Healthy Lifespan Of Nematodes” »

On the 23rd of this month, Dr. David Sinclair did an Ask Me Anything over at the Futurology subreddit in support of the NAD+ Mouse Project on Lifespan.io. There were a range of interesting questions from the community about his work in aging research, particularly the role of NAD+ in aging.

Dr. David A. Sinclair is a Professor in the Department of Genetics at Harvard Medical School and a co-joint Professor in the Department of Physiology and Pharmacology at the University of New South Wales. He is the co-Director of the Paul F. Glenn Laboratories for the Biological Mechanisms of Aging and a Senior Scholar of the Ellison Medical Foundation. He obtained his Ph.D. in Molecular Genetics at the University of New South Wales, Sydney in 1995. He worked as a postdoctoral researcher at M.I.T. with Dr. Leonard Guarente; there, he co-discovered a cause of aging for yeast as well as the role of Sir2 in epigenetic changes driven by genome instability.

More recently, he has been in the spotlight for his work with NAD+ precursors and their role in aging and has been helping to develop therapies that replace NAD+, which is lost with aging, in order to delay the diseases of old age. Below are a selection of questions and answers from the AMA, and we urge you to head over to Reddit Futurology to check out the other questions that people asked.

The brilliant Prof Judith Campisi from Buck Institute on Aging on senescence, senolytics, healthspan and more, a new interview.

Anti-aging pioneer Judith Campisi explains how a recent breakthrough could ward off age-related disease.

Colour blindness, otherwise known as colour vision deficiency, affects around 8% of men.

Flu sufferers now have a new option for relieving symptoms. Xofluza (baloxavir marboxil), a single-dose, oral prescription drug, was approved by the US Food and Drug Administration on Wednesday. The antiviral is the first new flu treatment approved by the FDA in nearly 20 years, FDA Commissioner Dr. Scott Gottlieb said in a statement.

“With thousands of people getting the flu every year, and many people becoming seriously ill, having safe and effective treatment alternatives is critical,” said Gottlieb.

The pill is intended for patients who are 12 or older and who have had symptoms for no more than 48 hours. When patients with the flu, a respiratory illness, are treated within 48 hours of becoming sick, antiviral drugs can reduce symptoms and duration of illness, according to the FDA.

A study suggests cardiorespiratory fitness is linked to a longer life, suggesting no exercise is worse for health than smoking or diabetes.

The genome editing system CRISPR has become a hugely important tool in medical research, and could ultimately have a significant impact in fields such as agriculture, bioenergy, and food security.