What We Learned From Progeria

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Malformed lamin A proteins lie at the root of the accelerated aging condition progeria. Via Nature, efforts to apply this new knowledge to "normal" aging: "In cells taken from the elderly, the nuclei tend to be wrinkled up, the DNA accumulates damage, and the levels of some proteins that package up DNA go askew ... This mirrors the same changes that they previously observed in cells from [Hutchinson-Gilford progeria syndrome (HGPS)] children. ... The team suggests that healthy cells always make a trace amount of an aberrant form of lamin A protein, but that young cells can sense and eliminate it. Elderly cells, it seems, cannot. Critically, blocking production of this deviant protein corrected all the problems with the nucleus. ... You can take these old cells and make them young again."

Link: http://www.nature.com/news/2006/060424/full/060424-11.html