Ron DePinho, Professor of Department of Cancer Biology, Division of Discovery Science at MD Anderson Cancer Center, shared a post on LinkedIn:
“A remarkable milestone: the first patient has received a cellular-reprogramming therapy designed to restore youthful function in damaged retinal cells. An exciting moment for regenerative medicine. Partial reprogramming has the potential to reset aspects of cellular age and function without fully erasing cell identity… a concept that could one day enable repair of tissues once thought irreversibly damaged. At the same time, caution is essential.
Reprogramming biology lives close to pathways that govern plasticity, altered cell identity, dedifferentiation, and carcinoma risk. The central challenge will be achieving rejuvenation without loss of lineage fidelity or oncogenic transformation.
The eye is a rational first setting because the risk can be more locally monitored and contained.
Importantly, the idea that aging phenotypes is now mainstream beginning with our TERT-ER model showing that systemic restoration of TERT could reverse degenerative tissue phenotypes, reawaken stem/progenitor compartments, and restore organ function in aged, telomere-dysfunctional animals.
That work taught us that aging is not simply a one-way decline but can include reversible cellular and tissue states. The current reprogramming trial is another important step toward that larger vision. Safe and effective whole-body rejuvenation of cell state remains a formidable challenge but it may be closer than we think. The future of aging science will depend on balancing ambition with rigor: rejuvenation without identity loss, regeneration without cancer, and translation without HYPE.
World-first: therapy to make cells young again trialled in a person.”
Other articles featuring Ron DePinho on OncoDaily.