Drug aims to block cell death to fight aging

Methuselah is smiling!

A LinkGevity motto "Pioneering Anti-Necrotics™"

"A UK start-up has designed a drug to slow aging by preventing necrosis — early cell death in response to injury or illness. LinkGevity says that its drug Link-001 has prevented necrosis in lab-grown models of human organs, by stopping the flow of calcium ions into cells. The company plans to test its anti-necrosis drug in people with damaged kidneys later this year, if it can win regulatory approval. Link-001 is a combination of two already-approved drugs, which LinkGevity hopes will help it move into the clinic quickly. To date, no longevity drugs have been approved because of debate over the underlying mechanisms of aging and relevant biomarkers."

Nature Briefing: Translational Research

Start-up takes aim at ageing with drug to block cell death (behind paywall)

But the company's pipelines are kept very vague. Secrecy or?

The beautiful mind behind this longevity research: Dr. Carina Kern, CEO of LinkGevity

Researchers discover yeast self-destruct pathway

Amazing stuff!

"... Future drugs to treat yeast and other fungal infections might target such mechanisms, the researchers say. ..."

From the abstract:

"Unicellular eukaryotes have been suggested as undergoing self-inflicted destruction. However, molecular details are sparse compared with the mechanisms of programmed/regulated cell death known for human cells and animal models. Here, we report a molecular cell death pathway in Saccharomyces cerevisiae leading to vacuole/lysosome membrane permeabilization. Following a transient cell death stimulus, yeast cells die slowly over several hours, consistent with an ongoing molecular dying process. A genome-wide screen for death-promoting factors identified all subunits of the AP-3 complex, a vesicle trafficking adapter known to transport and install newly synthesized proteins on the vacuole/lysosome membrane. ... Video microscopy revealed a sequence of events where vacuole permeability precedes the loss of plasma membrane integrity. AP-3-dependent death appears to be conserved in the human pathogenic yeast Cryptococcus neoformans."

Researchers discover yeast self-destruct pathway | Hub Finding adds to evidence that unicellular organisms have "regulated cell-death" processes like those found in animals; discovery could one day lead to new antifungal drugs

Yeast cell death pathway requiring AP-3 vesicle trafficking leads to vacuole/lysosome membrane permeabilization (open access)