Background: Biological aging begins decades before the onset of age-related clinical conditions and is mediated by both cellular senescence and declining adaptive immune function. These processes are functionally related with the rate of senescent cell accumulation dependent upon a balance between induction and immune clearance. We previously showed that biomarkers in these domains can identify patients at-risk of surgery-related adverse events.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Changes in cell-type composition of tissues are associated with a wide range of diseases and environmental risk factors and may be causally implicated in disease development and progression. However, these shifts in cell-type fractions are often of a low magnitude, or involve similar cell subtypes, making their reliable identification challenging. DNA methylation profiling in a tissue like blood is a promising approach to discover shifts in cell-type abundance, yet studies have only been performed at a relatively low cellular resolution and in isolation, limiting their power to detect shifts in tissue composition.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFTA-65 is a dietary supplement based on an improved formulation of a small molecule telomerase activator that was discovered in a systematic screening of natural product extracts from traditional Chinese medicines. This study summarizes the findings on telomere length (TL) changes from a randomized, double blind, placebo controlled study of TA-65 over a 1 year period. The study was conducted on 117 relatively healthy cytomegalovirus-positive subjects aged 53-87 years old.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFA short average telomere length is associated with low telomerase activity and certain degenerative diseases. Studies in animals and with human cells confirm a causal mechanism for cell or tissue dysfunction triggered by critically short telomeres, suggesting that telomerase activation may be an approach to health maintenance. Previously, we reported on positive immune remodeling in humans taking a commercial health maintenance program, PattonProtocol-1, composed of TA-65® (a natural product-derived telomerase activator) and other dietary supplements.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMost human cells lack sufficient telomerase to maintain telomeres, hence these genetic elements shorten with time and stress, contributing to aging and disease. In January, 2007, a commercial health maintenance program, PattonProtocol-1, was launched that included a natural product-derived telomerase activator (TA-65®, 10-50 mg daily), a comprehensive dietary supplement pack, and physician counseling/laboratory tests at baseline and every 3-6 months thereafter. We report here analysis of the first year of data focusing on the immune system.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF