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can young blood make you younger? and is it related to vampirism

Does drinking young blood make you young?

By Mv AjayPublished 2 years ago 11 min read
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We do always hear the word "drinking blood" in Dracula's folklore. We do wonder sometimes if it is really possible to be young by drinking blood. Don't we? There are some stories, like Elizebeth Bathory, which indicate that Youngblood may be the key to eternal youth. Is this really possible? Is this scientifically or medically proven? Well, we did some digging. In this article, we will explain to you why. So, follow the article to the end.

Does drinking blood make you young?

At the beginning of the 2000s, a group of researchers at Stanford University, California, revived a grisly process that was popular in the 1950s, referred to as parabiosis. They put mice in pairs, young and old, removed their skins, and then joined their sides in a way that both animals had the same blood circulation system. One month later, they observed signs of renewal in the livers and muscles of older mice.

The research findings published in 2005 sparked the interest of researchers, entrepreneurs, and the general public in the possibility of using young blood to rejuvenate the elderly. By the year 2016, demand had grown enough to drive the US-based startup named Ambrosia to begin offering expensive injections with young plasma, the component that is free of cells in the blood.

The process was criticized by authorities at the US Food and Drug Administration at the beginning of last year, both due to its inability to prove benefits in clinical trials and also for possible security concerns; Ambrosia closed, though it recently reopened.

A plethora of research-based startups are trying to unravel the mysteries of parabiosis and then use them to fight the age-related condition. By identifying the factors in plasma that change as we age, they hope to develop treatments that enhance what's beneficial in young blood or counteract what's harmful in older blood. One of them is starting to publish early results from clinical trials.

"There's still a lot to go as blood is a complex thing," says Aubrey de Grey, who runs the non-profit Sens (strategies for engineered minimal senescence) Research Foundation. But there are a lot of excellent laboratories that specialize in this area, and I'm optimistic about the progress.

While nobody believes that altering any one of the blood-related factors is the only solution to slowing or stopping aging, it is a potential option for interspersing different mechanisms of aging, allowing many aspects to be controlled simultaneously.

Alkahest

Alkahest's beautiful labs are located near the freeway linking San Francisco to Silicon Valley. The company was founded at the end of 2014 by Tony Wyss Coray, a neuroscientist from Stanford University after he published studies showing that the parabiosis-related rejuvenation effect extended to the brains of mice.

Old mice performed better in cognitive tasks and the development of new neurons. His research showed that it was the young plasma that produced the positive effect, with the plasma proteins proving to be the main culprit.

Alkahest has around 80 employees and more than $41.5 million in funding, and it is currently conducting clinical trials and releasing preliminary results." We're not only giant mice," claims Steven Braithwaite, the chief scientific officer of Alkahest. "We've observed a lot within our animals' models, which has convinced our scientists, yet we have to learn from other people."

In August the previous month, Alkahest announced the findings of a trial lasting six months that included 40 patients suffering from mild-to-moderate levels of Alzheimer's treated with a patented human plasma "fraction". It was found to slow the anticipated decline in mental capacity.

The sample was one of two Alkahest has come up with that are similar. Each has around 500 proteins, far fewer than the 10-20,000 proteins that are found in human plasma that are naturally found. The fractions are made of pooled plasma, which makes for a homogeneous and homogeneous product.

Alkahest was created by Grifols, a plasma-derived pharmaceutical company, which is also an investor in Alkahest. The fractions have fewer of the proteins that rise with the aging process (and tend to be harmful) but more of those that decrease with the aging process (and have the potential to benefit). The plasma pool's donors are in their 30s or early 40s generally, which is a lot older than the recipients who are intended to be.

Alkahest believes that these fractions can affect symptoms and slow the development of neurodegenerative disorders. Studies involving patients suffering from severe Alzheimer's and Parkinson's are expected to be published. After the positive results for patients suffering from moderate to mild Alzheimer's and mild to moderate Alzheimer's, a bigger trial with placebo control is being planned.

Based on the outcomes of the trials, it is hoped that treatments using fractionated plasma will be available within a decade. But the main point, says Braithwaite, isn't to be a plasma-enriched company. It's looking to further improve the quality of those fractions, possibly to 10 or 20 of the top proteins, and then bioengineer them without plasma. This is a necessity, says Braithwaite, as the plasma supply will always be limited.

Alkahest also has evidence to suggest that a medication that inhibits an old blood-forming protein may be able to help patients with AMD that is caused by aging.

Two studies of six-week duration for patients suffering from AMD The study of 29 people who had not been previously treated and 26 who had not responded well to the treatment that was in place revealed that the majority of them maintained or increased their visual acuity by the ease with which they were able to read a standard eye chart.

They received a drug created by Alkahest to block the transmission of a harmful protein known as eotaxin that Wyss-Coray observed was increased in old mice and can have negative consequences.

Elevian

Startup Elevian is also looking to commercialize the potential of parabiosis. It was co-founded in the year 2018 by Amy Wagers, who was part of the Stanford parabiosis revival group and is currently a professor of stem cells and regeneration biology at Harvard University.

The company is headquartered in Boston but has an office in Silicon Valley. It is supported by $9.4 million in the capital, including a portion from the company led by Peter Diamandis, a tech businessman, and futurist. It is developing therapies that increase the activities of Growth Differentiation Factor 11 (GDF11), a protein in blood plasma that exists in tiny amounts, which it believes reduces as mice age.

Research published in 2013 and 2014 by Wagers Lab and the labs of the other scientists who are co-founders, revealed that the old mice that were injected with GDF11 reproduced many of the parabiosis results and showed degenerative changes in the heart, skeletal muscle, and brain.

GDF11 is the only thing that has been proven in mice to have beneficial effects across a variety of major organs that diminish as we age, says Wagers.

Elevian is currently working to scale up GDF11 production before the launch of its first human trial. The company is first looking to determine whether the injections of GDF11 can aid in recovering from strokes. "Stroke recuperation is an important medical need that is not being met," says Mark Allen, the CEO of Elevian.

It's also working to create new molecules that may allow for lower frequency GDF11 injections. It is also working on a project that uses artificial intelligence to find tiny molecules that could trigger GDF11's biochemical actions, meaning patients could take an alternative pill.

GDF11 is not without controversy. It's been difficult to replicate some regeneration studies, putting the validity of their use as a possible treatment.

Nathan LeBrasseur is a scientist who studies aging at Mayo Clinic, a not-for-profit academic medical center located in Minnesota. His lab was unable to determine whether GDF11 was altered with time. "I'm looking for the potential for therapeutic benefits," he says.

"For the cardiac and skeletal muscles, I haven't seen any evidence of a positive result from GDF11 beyond the first papers. However, while there's a chance of positive effects from GDF11 for the brain, stopping negative effects on muscles or the heart could be a difficult task."

According to Paul Robbins, a researcher who studies age-related biology at the University of Minnesota, the negative findings don't necessarily indicate that the initial findings are incorrect. "It's just that it's a complex system and the question is how it works in certain hands but not in others," he says.

Wagers acknowledges that there is a lot to learn concerning GDF11 biology. She explains that the protein can be difficult to determine because it reacts with other proteins and can be present in active and inactive versions. However, she and Allen are in favor of the improvement observed in the heart and muscles when GDF11 was added to the diet.

A "therapeutic window" might be the cause, as suggested by Wagers. A small amount or too much of a result can be detrimental. Many studies have contradictory results and employ high doses. There's "strong evidence to move forward" using Elevian's program, says Wagers.

Her research group, which is funded by the corporation, is working on more experiments to test the hypothesis they are based on. "We're letting the data guide us, and we'll report regardless of the result," she says. Controversy can propel the field forward.

Which strategy is most likely to slow down or reverse the progression of age-related illnesses by focusing on the effects of parabiosis? According to Robbins, the plasma fractions of Alkahest are the "safe option."

"I cannot say that the outcomes from the clinic [to date] have been spectacular, but I am confident that they'll have something effective." Elevian could be more likely to hit the mark if it can solve the issues with GDF11's biological basis. "If it can work in the manner it was originally published, it may alter our aging treatment," says Robbins.

For LeBrasseur, the most promising approach is the approach taken by Alkahest to fix old blood by blocking bad proteins. The aging of the blood is believed to cause inflammation and hinder rejuvenation. LeBrasseur notes, "Addressing what is causing this could prove more efficient than bleeding in young people."

Ambrosia, plasma, and the FDA

In the year 2016, Jesse Karmazin began offering infusions of young plasma to fight aging without any evidence to prove that the treatment was effective. As the year 2018 came to an end, Ambrosia was the US company he co-founded that charges $8000 for one liter or a reduced $12,000 for two, and established clinics across five US cities.

In February of this year, the FDA issued a general caution to the public: plasma infusions of young people offer "no evidence-based clinical benefits" for warding off aging and ailments. Like any plasma product, infusions may present risks.

The company wasn't initially warned by the FDA. "It was from nowhere," says Karmazin, who shut down operations due to concern and to be aware of how the FDA's policy was being implemented. In October, after an eight-month break, Ambrosia reopened as a reduced-scale operation, with the clinic located in San Francisco.

According to Karmazin, the law is in his favor. Plasma is a drug that has been approved, but his treatment is an off-label procedure and is permitted. Although the FDA declaration states that procedures like his "should" be done in conjunction with an existing Investigational New Drug (IND) application, it's not the same thing as saying that they have to be. "My lawyers are telling me that I have the legal right to do the same thing," he says.

Ambrosia's strategy irritates a lot of scientists who want to apply the results of parabiosis to treatments that slow or reverse the aging process. It's unfortunate, according to Amy Wagers of Elevian, when scientific research and the Ambrosia method are conflated.

"I believe this is a sign that the FDA made the correct decision," she says. In the meantime, Karmazin says he still plans to release the findings of a clinical study of patients who received infusions that compared their biomarkers before and after (it was not placebo-controlled). However, first, he's trying to get the company back on its feet.

The question of whether the FDA will go after Ambrosia in the future is not clear. The FDA doesn't provide any information on compliance issues, but did say in an announcement that it had not "licensed or authorized any plasma products obtained from young blood donors' use in any way."

Also read: Vampire Legends from the history

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