Fight Aging!

Harmful actions on the part of senescent cells, whose numbers increase with age, is one of the root causes of degenerative aging. There is a growing interest in building therapies to clear out these problem cells and thereby postpone age-related disease and lengthen health life. Researchers here take the interesting step of protecting senescent cells from the usual array of evolved systems that try (and often fail) to destroy them, implanting these protected cells in mice, and then observing the results. This study provides evidence to suggest that the problem isn't just the senescent cells themselves, but that their presence also produces unwanted behavior in the immune system, and the development of a senescent-like class of immune cells.

Senescent cells (SCs) have been considered a source of age-related chronic sterile systemic inflammation and a target for anti-aging therapies. To understand mechanisms controlling the amount of SCs, we analyzed the phenomenon of rapid clearance of human senescent fibroblasts implanted into SCID mice, which can be overcome when SCs were embedded into alginate beads preventing them from immunocyte attack. To identify putative SC killers, we analyzed the content of cell populations formed around the SC-containing beads.

One of the major cell types attracted by secretory factors of SCs was a subpopulation of macrophages characterized by p16(Ink4a) gene expression and β-galactosidase activity at pH6.0 (β-galpH6), thus resembling SCs. Consistently, mice with p16(Ink4a) promoter-driven luciferase, developed bright luminescence of their peritoneal cavity within two weeks following implantation of SCs embedded in alginate beads. p16(Ink4a)/β-galpH6-expressing cells had surface biomarkers of macrophages F4/80 and were sensitive to liposomal clodronate used for the selective killing of macrophages. At the same time, clodronate failed to kill bona fide SCs generated in vitro by genotoxic stress. Old mice with elevated proportion of p16(Ink4a)/β-galpH6-positive cells in their tissues demonstrated reduction of both following systemic clodronate treatment, indicating that a significant proportion of cells previously considered to be SCs are actually a subclass of macrophages.

These observations point at a significant role of p16(Ink4a)/β-galpH6-positive macrophages in aging, which previously was attributed solely to SCs. They require reinterpretation of the mechanisms underlying rejuvenating effects following eradication of p16(Ink4a)/β-galpH6-positive cells and reconsideration of potential cellular target for anti-aging treatment.

Link: http://www.aging-us.com/article/XFECL8coa6th4i87b/text