Make no mistake
A Russian scientist commented on the experiments of the Chinese to slow down aging
Konstantin Krutovsky, a professor at the Göttingen and Siberian Federal Universities, a leading researcher at the N.I. Vavilov Institute of General Genetics of the Russian Academy of Sciences, called the experiments of Chinese geneticists on slowing down aging important, but far from practical application.
"A very important study that helps to understand the genetic and epigenetic mechanisms of aging. However, it is very far from practical application in order to slow down aging," Professor Krutovsky said in an interview with the Chinese news agency Sputnik. The results of a six-year study by a team of scientists from the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Peking University were published in the journal Science Translational Medicine.
During experiments with mice, Chinese scientists proved that deactivation of the KAT7 gene can slow down aging. As a result, 81% of genetically modified mice lived for more than 130 weeks. Only 27% of normal mice were able to live that long.
Krutovsky fears that disabling this gene may disrupt the work of other genes associated with it:
"After all, this gene originated in the process of evolution, and its functioning is supported by natural selection. So, it is important and necessary. It may turn out that disabling it will also cause undesirable side effects."
Using CRISPR technology, scientists have separately studied more than 20 thousand genes contained in the human genome one by one. With the help of "genetic scissors", a certain gene was "cut out" in the cell and we looked at how it affects different signs.
After processing such a large amount of data, the team of researchers identified genes that affect the aging of human cells. As a result, it was found that inactivation of these genes can slow down aging.
According to the Russian geneticist, scientists have yet to find out what effects are caused by disabling this gene or reducing its activity, and in which tissues, cells or organs, or at what stages of the development of the body, it can benefit, and in which cases it will be harmful.
"The value of this work is that it shows an effective method of selectively switching off certain genes using modern methods of gene editing using the CRISPR-Cas9 system. These methods allow you to switch off, insert, replace and edit genes, including those mutations in which lead to various senile diseases, including dementia, Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease, joint diseases and cardiovascular system."
CRISPR/Cas9 is a powerful genome editing tool. It is based on an element of the bacterial defense system, which biologists have adapted to make changes to the DNA of plants, animals and even humans. The technology allows you to make corrections in just a few days, not weeks or months.
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