Could it be our bodies could, eventually, could turn back the clock on aging cells?

This study suggests that may be the case.

As usual, we have to say this: This is a mouse study. This has to work in people before this finding can be confirmed.

Still, it is very exciting. Some geriatricians say that being older does not cause disease—it’s the other way around. Illnesses and other medical conditions can age the body.

This research was done at Joslin Diabetes Center, which is part of Harvard, and was published in the January 27 online edition of Nature.

Business Week/Health Day News

“Scientists have found a way to make old stem cells in the blood act like young stem cells, a discovery that could lead to ways to slow the aging process. (Emphasis added)

“Taking certain factors from the blood of young mice and putting them in old mice made old stem cells take on the characteristics of younger stem cells. In addition, the tissues of the older mice appeared much more “youthful,” according to the Harvard Stem Cell Institute researchers at the Joslin Diabetes Center.”

…”The study findings are published in the Jan. 27 issue of the journal Nature.

“What’s most exciting is that the changes that occur in blood stem cells during aging are reversible, through signals carried by the blood itself. This means that the blood system offers a potential therapeutic avenue for age-related stem cell dysfunction,” Amy J. Wagers, an associate professor in Harvard’s Department of Stem Cell and Regenerative Biology, and an investigator at the Joslin Diabetes Center, said in a news release from the center.” (Emphasis added)

Source: Business Week/Health Day News, January 27, 2010

Citation: Nature advance online publication 27 January 2010 | doi:10.1038/nature08797