Reversing aging – with poo!

Who wouldn’t want to age better – well the results of an unsual study are in and the results are promising and may make many of you who are aging prick up your ears.

The results showed that by transferring gut microbiota from younger to older mice improved multiple signs of aging in the gut, the eyes, and the brain. So far so good but the method with which this is done may make you cringe. This transfer is done through faecal transplants, yes, that is transplanting poo, or matter from your gut!

Now though this may sound disgusting, this is also a known treatment in cases of gut disorders – with a lot of success. Indeed, I have reported on the multiple impacts of the microbiota, our collection of bacteria, on multiple disorders ranging from loneliness, to depression, to increased cognitive ability. It seems like our microbiota is an essential ingredient to remaining healthy and particularly also in aging well.

This particular experiment was focused on aging and also follows on from positive results from blood plasma transplants between young and old mice. Of note is also that the experimental protocol involved faecal transplants from young to older mice and measuring the impacts through different biological markers, and alternatively transferring faecal matter from old mice to young mice and also measuring the impacts.

As already mentioned, when transferring from young to old, the older mice saw improvements in multiple markers in the gut, eyes, and brain. In the reverse condition when the young mice received faecal matter from old mice their condition deteriorated showing the opposite effects with increased inflammation in the brain and depletion of a protein required for normal vision.

This opens up promising new avenues for aging well – and yes, there are already plenty of startups in this space – I am sure that will only increase.

I for one am watching this space closely.