Lifeboat Foundation

Stem cells are pluripotent cells, having a property of differentiating into various types of cells of human body. Several studies have developed mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) from various human tissues, peripheral blood and body fluids. These cells are then characterized by cellular and molecular markers to understand their specific phenotypes. Dental pulp stem cells (DPSCs) are having a MSCs phenotype and they are differentiated into neuron, cardiomyocytes, chondrocytes, osteoblasts, liver cells and β cells of islet of pancreas. Thus, DPSCs have shown great potentiality to use in regenerative medicine for treatment of various human diseases including dental related problems. These cells can also be developed into induced pluripotent stem cells by incorporation of pluripotency markers and use for regenerative therapies of various diseases. The DPSCs are derived from various dental tissues such as human exfoliated deciduous teeth, apical papilla, periodontal ligament and dental follicle tissue. This review will overview the information about isolation, cellular and molecular characterization and differentiation of DPSCs into various types of human cells and thus these cells have important applications in regenerative therapies for various diseases. This review will be most useful for postgraduate dental students as well as scientists working in the field of oral pathology and oral medicine.

Keywords: Human dental pulp stem cells, Mesenchymal stem cells, Dentin, Pluripotency, Stem cell therapy, Molecular markers.

Core tip: Human dental pulp stem cells (DPSCs) have shown a potentiality for the treatment of various human diseases including dental related problems. The review will overview the information about DPSCs, their isolation, cellular and molecular characterization, differentiation into various types of cells and their applications in regenerative therapies for various diseases. This review will be most useful for postgraduate dental students as well as the scientists working in the field of oral pathology, oral medicine and regenerative medicine.

Continue reading “Human dental pulp stem cells: Applications in future regenerative medicine” »

David Sinclair is a Professor in the Department of Genetics at Harvard Medical School and co-Director of the Paul Glenn Centre for the Biological Mechanisms of Ageing.

Today we hear from a scientist at the cutting edge of longevity research as Professor Sinclair gives us a fascinating insight into the world of anti-ageing.

Continue reading “PROFESSOR DAVID SINCLAIR | Can Humans Live For 1000 Years? | Modern Wisdom Podcast #066” »

Rejuvenation ResearchVol. 18, No. 5Original ArticlesOpen Access Open Access license Persistence of Long-Term Memory in Vitrified and Revived Caenorhabditis elegans Natasha Vita-More and Daniel Barranco Natasha Vita-MoreAlcor Research Center (ARC), Alcor Life Extension Foundation, Scottsdale, Arizona. U…

What’s new at RAADfest 2019?? Besides RAADclinic, new topics will be discussed: Check it out and Register now: http://www.raadfest.com/

(Editor’s note: This podcast is from The Not Old – Better Show.)

As part of our Inside Science and Technology interview series, today’s show is an interview with Dr. Pradeep Reddy, a research scientist at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies.

As we all know in the Not Old Better Show audience, aging is a leading risk factor for a number of debilitating conditions, including heart disease, cancer and Alzheimer’s disease, to name a few. This makes the need for anti-aging therapies all the more urgent. Now, Salk Institute researchers have developed a new gene therapy that is showing promise as a possible way to decelerate the aging process in humans. It uses CRISPR genome-editing technology.

Continue reading “New Gene Therapy Could Slow Aging in Humans” »

Aging is by far the dominant risk factor for the development of cardiovascular diseases, whose prevalence dramatically increases with increasing age reaching epidemic proportions. In the elderly, pathologic cellular and molecular changes in cardiac tissue homeostasis and response to injury result in progressive deteriorations in the structure and function of the heart. Although the phenotypes of cardiac aging have been the subject of intense study, the recent discovery that cardiac homeostasis during mammalian lifespan is maintained and regulated by regenerative events associated with endogenous cardiac stem cell (CSC) activation has produced a crucial reconsideration of the biology of the adult and aged mammalian myocardium. The classical notion of the adult heart as a static organ, in terms of cell turnover and renewal, has now been replaced by a dynamic model in which cardiac cells continuously die and are then replaced by CSC progeny differentiation. However, CSCs are not immortal. They undergo cellular senescence characterized by increased ROS production and oxidative stress and loss of telomere/telomerase integrity in response to a variety of physiological and pathological demands with aging. Nevertheless, the old myocardium preserves an endogenous functionally competent CSC cohort which appears to be resistant to the senescent phenotype occurring with aging. The latter envisions the phenomenon of CSC ageing as a result of a stochastic and therefore reversible cell autonomous process. However, CSC aging could be a programmed cell cycle-dependent process, which affects all or most of the endogenous CSC population. The latter would infer that the loss of CSC regenerative capacity with aging is an inevitable phenomenon that cannot be rescued by stimulating their growth, which would only speed their progressive exhaustion. The resolution of these two biological views will be crucial to design and develop effective CSC-based interventions to counteract cardiac aging not only improving health span of the elderly but also extending lifespan by delaying cardiovascular disease-related deaths.

Over the last decades, average life expectancy has significantly increased worldwide although several chronic diseases continue to grow, with aging as their main risk factor [1]. Aging is a natural and inevitable degenerative process of biological functions characterized by the progressive decline in tissue and organ homeostasis and function. Despite the significant improvements in diagnosis and treatment, the majority of individuals older than 65 years of age suffer from an elevated risk to develop cardiovascular diseases (CVDs), with a decline in the quality of life and in the ability to perform the normal activities of daily living [1]. Aging produces numerous changes in the human heart at structural, molecular, and functional levels [2].

Join us at 7pm tonight! watch the livestream from our YouTube channel at 7pm.

Dr. Sandra Kaufmann

Continue reading “The Kaufmann Protocol: Why we age and how to stop it” »

The colorful Clownfish lives longer than 20 years in the aquarium. Researchers of the Scuola Normale Superiore in Pisa, Italy, in collaboration with the Leibniz Institute on Aging (FLI) in Jena, Germany, have investigated the genetics behind the longevity of clownfish. By sequencing the genome and comparing the sequences with other species, they were able to show, that the secret of this longevity lies in the mitochondria and lysosomes of the clownfish. Because it is uncomplicated to keep and breed clownfish, they represent an interesting new animal model for research on longevity. The results are now published in the journal BMC Evolutionary Biology.

Clownfish, famous because of the Disney movie “Finding Nemo,” are a bright orange-white-black colored fish with three vertical stripes, which occur in the western Pacific and Indian Oceans. Clownfish live in symbiotic relationship with sea anemone. They are reliant on sea anemone for shelter in their natural habitat, which offer protection for the fish with its tentacles. The Clownfish’s mucus protection prevents it from being stung by the tentacles of the sea anemone. Thanks to this survival strategy, clownfish have a lower mortality rate than other fishes and can grow quite old. Until now there was not much known about the lifespan of this interesting sea dweller.