SENS Research Foundation and Buck Institute to Collaborate on a New Approach to Clearing Neurofibrillary Tangles
The SENS Research Foundation staff have over the past decade pioneered the field of medical bioremediation, mining the bacterial world for enzymes capable of breaking down the various forms of metabolic waste associated with aging and age-related disease. Suitable enzymes can form the basis for rejuvenation therapies that work via clearance of these waste products, and thus far the SENS teams have spun off the results of their work into development programs at Human Rejuvenation Technologies, to treat atherosclerosis, and Ichor Therapeutics, to treat macular degeneration. Today the SENS Research Foundation announced a new collaboration with the Buck Institute for Research on Aging in order to apply this same approach to the clearance of altered forms of tau protein that cause harm in Alzheimer's disease and other tauopathies. Much of present day Alzheimer's research focuses on clearance of amyloid, but it is becoming clear that both amyloid and tau aggregates are involved in the pathology of the condition. Unfortunately, while there are some signs of progress, work on tau clearance lags years behind the efforts put into amyloid clearance. Here is a chance for that side of the field to catch up:
The SENS Research Foundation (SRF) has launched a new research program in collaboration with the Buck Institute for Research on Aging. A leading expert on age-related neurodegenerative diseases will be leading the project in the Andersen lab at the Buck. The program is focused on the formation of tau tangles in the progression of neurodegenerative diseases. It will explore the elimination of these age-related waste products in brain cells, using the same approach that SRF has applied in its atherosclerosis and macular degeneration research projects in recent years. The Andersen lab will bring its own world-leading expertise in age-related neurodegeneration to the project. "Our ultimate goal is to find treatments for Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease. Working with SRF will enable us to look at whether it is possible to use a new method to reverse and prevent the formation of tau tangles, which will help us make significant progress in addressing these complex disorders."
This research has been made possible through the generous support of the Forever Healthy Foundation and its founder Michael Greve, as well as the support of our other donors. The Forever Healthy Foundation is a private nonprofit initiative whose mission is to enable people to vastly extend their healthy lifespans and be part of the first generation to cure aging. In order to accelerate the development of therapies to get aging under full medical control, the Forever Healthy Foundation directly supports cutting edge research aimed at the molecular and cellular repair of damage caused by the aging process. "We are extremely proud to be supporting this project and partnering with the Buck. With this and other collaborations we are planning, SRF looks forward to expanding our contribution to the advancement of medical research on pathologies associated with human aging."