Systemic Problems: A perspective on stem cell aging and rejuvenation

Irina M. Conboy¹, Michael J. Conboy¹, Justin Rebo¹

¹Department of Bioengineering, UC Berkeley; QB3, CA 94709, USA

Received: August 5, 2015Accepted: October 2, 2015Published: October 25, 2015

Copyright: © 2015 Conboy et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Abstract

This review provides balanced analysis of the advances in systemic regulation of young and old tissue stem cells and suggests strategies for accelerating development of therapies to broadly combat age-related tissue degenerative pathologies. Many highlighted recent reports on systemic tissue rejuvenation combine parabiosis with a “silver bullet” putatively responsible for the positive effects. Attempts to unify these papers reflect the excitement about this experimental approach and add value in reproducing previous work. At the same time, defined molecular approaches, which are “beyond parabiosis” for the rejuvenation of multiple old organs represent progress toward attenuating or even reversing human tissue aging.