TEXTO:
Scientists are one step closer to delaying aging By Amy Woodyatt, CNN
Updated 2305 GMT (0705 HKT) July 21, 2020
(CNN)Getting old is inevitable, but scientists at
the University of California San Diego (UCSD) may
be one step closer to being able to delay the aging
process.
[5] A team of scientists studied aging in yeast —
chosen because its cells are easily manipulated — to
try to understand if different cells age at the same rate,
and for the same reason.
What they found was intriguing. Even cells
[10] made of the same genetic materials and within the
same environment aged in "strikingly distinct ways,"
according to the scientists, who published their
findings in the journal Science.
About half of the yeast cells aged because of a
[15] gradual decline in the nucleolus, a round body located
in the nucleus of a cell, the scientists learned, by
using techniques including microfluidics and computer
modeling.
However, the other half aged because of a
[20] dysfunction of mitochondria, which produce a cell's
energy.
Scientists said that the cells go down one of two
paths — nuclear or mitochondrial — early in life, and
they continue with the aging route until they ultimately
[25] decline and die.
Researchers performed further tests to
understand how the cells behaved.
"To understand how cells make these decisions,
we identified the molecular processes underlying
[30] each aging route and the connections among them,
revealing a molecular circuit that controls cell aging,
analogous to electric circuits that control home
appliances," said Nan Hao, senior author of the study
and an associate professor in UCSD's division of
[35] biological sciences' molecular biology section.
After modeling the "aging landscape," the team
of researchers found they could manipulate — and
optimize — the process of aging, using computer
simulations to reprogram the master circuit and modify
[40] its DNA.
They were then able to create a "novel aging
route," with a dramatically extended lifespan. This,
researchers believe, could ultimately lead to the
possibility of delaying human aging.
[45] "This is an aging path that never existed, but
because we understand how it is regulated, we can
basically design or a new aging path," Hao.
Disponível em: https://edition.cnn.com/2020/07/21/health/slowaging-intl-scli-scn/index.html. Acesso em: 6 out 2021.
Aditional tests allowed scientists to find out that
