You're Gonna Live Forever

Scientists have pinpointed a chemical ‘switch’ that can reverse the “biological clock” by making human muscles younger and stronger. Really? I thought they already knew that...it's called dating younger women.

As time passes, our muscles slowly lose their ability to regenerate. This not only occurs in the muscles of our arms, legs and torso but also the internal ones such as our hearts. See it's not just me, baby - it happens to a lot of guys. Researchers have shown that the process appears to turn-off in elderly patients – preventing the fibres from repairing themselves so they begin to wither away. But when the switch is turned back on, it triggers a chain of events that allows muscles to rejuvenate. To reach the conclusion, researchers from the University of California at Berkeley carried out tests on tissue samples from around 30 healthy men. Half the volunteers were 21 to 24-year-olds and half aged between 68 and 74.

Samples of tissue were "surgically" removed from the participants’ thighs, not by hungry canines as once thought. Then the volunteers had one of their legs immobilised in a cast for two weeks so their muscles began to waste. Following the removal of the casts, the men exercised with weights. Then more tissue samples were removed three days, and then four weeks later. When tests were carried out on these samples, scientists found that during the exercise period the muscles of younger volunteers had four times more regenerative stem cells engaged in tissue repair than those of older participants. Old muscle also showed signs of damaging inflammation and scarring.

After analyses, they found that a key protein is needed to allow muscle stem cells to get to work repairing tissue. And in case of older people, the protein called mitogen-activated protein kinase, was missing. When it was added to samples of elderly patients’ muscles, they began to repair. Conversely, when it was blocked in younger patients, they did not repair as well. Soon drugs will be developed to take advantage of this protein, but until that time, you'll need the blood of Jack Lalanne to stay healthy.