{"id":170304,"date":"2023-08-23T21:24:13","date_gmt":"2023-08-24T02:24:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2023\/08\/a-surprising-new-protein-player-restores-memory-in-old-mice"},"modified":"2023-08-23T21:24:13","modified_gmt":"2023-08-24T02:24:13","slug":"a-surprising-new-protein-player-restores-memory-in-old-mice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2023\/08\/a-surprising-new-protein-player-restores-memory-in-old-mice","title":{"rendered":"A Surprising New Protein Player Restores Memory in Old Mice"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/a-surprising-new-protein-player-restores-memory-in-old-mice2.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41586-023-06436-3\">The new study<\/a>, published in <em>Nature<\/em>, showed that the unassuming protein is far from a one-trick pony. Rather than a simple protein cog in the body\u2019s wound-healing machine, PF4 also acts as an ambassador between the brain and the immune system. When young, the protein \u201cgatekeeper\u201d tunes down inflammation and helps maintain the brain\u2019s cognitive functions.<\/p>\n<p>Unfortunately, PF4 levels in the body nosedive with age. The drop incites a spark of inflammation in the brain\u2019s \u201cmemory center\u201d\u2014the hippocampus\u2014and hampers the neurons\u2019 ability to communicate. Neural networks misfire. As does memory: an aged animal struggles to remember new places or learn new tasks.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s not all bad news. In one test, a jab of PF4 partially reset the body\u2019s immune system, lowering levels of proteins that promote inflammation, and boosted cognition in elderly mice.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The new study, published in Nature, showed that the unassuming protein is far from a one-trick pony. Rather than a simple protein cog in the body\u2019s wound-healing machine, PF4 also acts as an ambassador between the brain and the immune system. When young, the protein \u201cgatekeeper\u201d tunes down inflammation and helps maintain the brain\u2019s cognitive [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":661,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-170304","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biotech-medical","category-robotics-ai"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/170304","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/661"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=170304"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/170304\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=170304"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=170304"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=170304"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}