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(From various news services)
In the journal Science Aug. 27 is a report hailed by many as a milestone in methods of aging research. Richard Weindruch and Thomas Prolla (U. Wisconsin) discussed a powerful new technology called ``gene chips,'' dime-size glass chips that can analyze thousands of genes at once, detecting activity in more than 6,000 mouse genes at different stages of life. (One of the companies developing this work is Affymetrix, NASDAQ symbol AFFX.)
The reported research was on mice, studying the molecular level effects of calorie restricted diets, known for many years to extend life span of rodents when begun early in life. Some studies have also suggested usefulness in later life.
(However, there are also studies which suggest that, in humans, there is no correlation between moderate overweight and morbidity--and thin old people may even die sooner than chubby old people.)
The conclusions of the mouse study have not been tested in humans and there are no ``fountain of youth'' drugs yet, though researchers said the findings could represent a large step toward achieving that goal.
``This is a leap in our understanding of how caloric restriction works,'' said Weindruch. "There hasn't been much consensus on how caloric restriction retards aging.''
Using the genetic chips, from young adult and older mice, researchers were able to determine that less than 2 percent of the genes surveyed changed their activity markedly with age. With further analysis, the researchers discovered the genes were responsible for crucial biological functions -- like stress responses, energy production and protein repair.
For example, the researchers found that specific genes that direct repairs of a cell's genetic material were highly active in the older mice, underscoring the role of cellular impairments in the aging process.
``At the molecular level, normal aging looks like a state of chronic injury,'' said Prolla.
They found that 29 percent of the age-related changes in gene activity were completely blocked in the dieting mice and 34 percent of the changes were partially suppressed. That means that the dieting mice are ``biologically younger'' than their normal counterparts, according to the study.
Beyond linking dieting and the aging process, the study also showed the power and the promise of genetic chip technology, to quickly scan changes in many genes at once, and as a tool to examine the effects of new drugs targeted at blocking cellular aging.
``This study has analyzed more genes with regard to aging than all previous studies combined,'' said Prolla.