New Scientist - 14.09.2019

12 | New Scientist | 14 September 2019

“The nests of European
honeybees are often
devastated by the small
hive beetle and its larvae”

Ageing

News

IS THIS the world’s first age-

reversal medicine? A group of

nine men have followed a year-

long drug regime that appeared

to reverse the ageing process,

leaving them biologically a

year and half younger than

when they started.

The clinical trial was the first

to investigate the possibility

that a drug might be able to

reverse some of the biological

signs of ageing, increasing

lifespan. However, the results

are only tentative because this

was a feasibility study and

there was no control group.

Greg Fahy, at 21st Century

Medicine in Fontana,

California, and his colleagues

gave the nine men, aged

between 51 and 65, a

drug cocktail including

recombinant human growth

hormone three to four times

a week for a year. At the

beginning and the end of the

trial, the team measured the

participants’ biological age.

We all have a chronological

age – the number of candles

on our birthday cake – and an

epigenetic, or biological age,

which is a measure of how

quickly the cells in our body

are deteriorating compared

with the average seen in the

general population. These

two figures can differ, and

our epigenetic age is often a

better predictor of lifespan.

Fahy’s team used four tests

of epigenetic age. On average,

across the tests, the volunteers’

epigenetic age was 1.5 years

younger after the treatment.

The most advanced test,

“GrimAge” – named after the

Grim Reaper – showed a two-

year decrease in epigenetic

versus chronological age that

persisted six months after

the men stopped taking the

drug therapy (Aging Cell,

doi.org/c985).

Without also testing the

effect of a placebo, it is difficult

to prove that the intervention

caused the anti-ageing effect.

However, the team says that

despite the small number of

participants, the results

wouldn’t be expected by

chance, and it is unlikely that

lifestyle changes would have

contributed significantly.

Fahy and his colleagues

acknowledge that a placebo

effect could have influenced

the results, which they

will study in a future trial

involving 100 participants.

Spontaneous ageing reversal

is unlikely, says Fahy. “If

placebo by itself caused such

a strong effect, it would be

expected that many prior

interventions would have

reported similar effects.”

The drug cocktail used in

the trial was designed to repair

the thymus, a small organ that

plays a key role in the immune

system, and which shrinks

with age. This shrinking is

linked to poor immune

function and early death.

Fahy’s team gave

recombinant human growth

hormone to the participants

because studies suggest it can

regenerate the thymus. Too

much of it can trigger diabetes,

however, so the participants

took additional drugs to

prevent this. ❚

A BITE from a funnel-web spider

delivers neurotoxins that can kill

an adult human in hours, or a child

in minutes. Yet they might be our

friends in the fight against the

small hive beetle, a dangerous

new threat to bees.

In southern Africa, where it

originates, the small hive beetle

(Aethina tumida) is a minor pest.

African honeybees defend their

nests so aggressively that the

invader rarely gets a foothold.

Outside Africa, however, nests

of European honeybees (Apis

mellifera) are often devastated by

the beetle and its larvae, which

devour the honey, pollen and brood,

destroy the combs and sometimes

introduce diseases. Some pesticides

can kill the beetles, but they would

harm the bees as well.

Now Elaine Fitches and her

colleagues at the University of

Durham, UK, and Fera Science,

a firm co-owned by the UK

Department for Environment, Food

and Rural Affairs, think funnel-web

spiders may provide the weapon

we need to stop the beetles.

Spider venom used to

kill pests but not bees

Biochemistry

Leo Benedictus Helen Thomson

ROBERT VALENTIC/NATUREPL.COM

Spider venom contains a cocktail

of ingredients, and one of the

funnel-web’s toxins – Hv1a – is

fatal to most insects, including

small hive beetles, but seems to

have no effect on bees or humans.

The trouble is that Hv1a needs

to be injected. If beetles swallow

the toxin, it degrades in their gut

and has little effect.

So Fitches and her team have

bound Hv1a to a molecule found

in the spring-flowering common

snowdrop (Galanthus nivalis),

which effectively carries it

through the gut barrier. In the

lab, the team fed this “fusion

protein” in a sugar solution

to beetles and their larvae.

After two days, the larvae started

“writhing”. Within a week, all the

larvae and adults were dead. The

team also placed beetle eggs on a

piece of honeycomb containing bee

brood, which was then sprayed

with the engineered compound.

The honeycomb and bees survived

virtually untouched, but most of

the new beetle larvae died (Journal

of Pest Science, doi.org/c96x).

“I was absolutely chuffed to bits

with these results,” Fitches says. ❚

The highly toxic venom of

funnel-web spiders could

help protect bees

Early signs

for a drug

that can roll

back the

years look

encouraging

MICHAEL HEIM/EYEEM/GETTY

Drug cocktail

lowers biological

age in men