X-Message-Number: 11287
Date: Thu, 18 Feb 1999 19:28:08 -0500
From: Jan Coetzee <>
Subject: Protein Holds Clues About Aging

Cancer Fighting Protein Holds Clues About Aging

LONDON (Reuters) - A protein that helps the body fight cancer may hold
important clues about
the aging process.

New Scientist magazine said U.S. scientists suspect tumor necrosis
factor (TNF), a protein that
triggers apoptosis, or programmed death, in diseased or mutated cells,
also weakens the immune
system as people grow older.

``Researchers in California say that as the body ages, protective cells
of the immune system
become hypersensitive to the protein, and die at high rates,'' the
weekly magazines said
Wednesday.

Immunologist Sudhir Gupta, and a team of researchers at the University
of California at Irvine,
examined levels of CD4 and CD8 immune cells in blood samples taken from
students and
retired professors.

``When exposed to TNF, 26 percent of the CD8 cells from the young
subjects underwent
apoptosis. By contrast, 40 percent of the aged CD8s committed suicide.
The researchers found a
similar increase in cell death among the older group's CD4 cells,
suggesting they had become
more sensitive to TNF,'' the magazine added.

Gupta said TNF is only part of the story of the weakening immune system
and aging, but it could
be an important one. He believes drugs could one day help to slow the
process.

``If we can delay the cell-death process, we may improve not just life
span but the quality of life
in old age,'' he said.

J.C.

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