Beyond the Abstract – Details, episodes & analysis

Humans have long sought the fountain of youth, and recently scientists have explored the biological basis of aging and potential strategies to reverse the process. Along with groundbreaking discoveries that have enabled extending the lifespan of model organisms, the anti-aging movement has spurred an entire industry focused on stopping the biological clock. In today's episode of Beyond the Abstract, Derek and Dan discuss recent studies about the aging process and debate the promises and pitfalls of this fast-moving field.

This episode is sponsored by Proteintech Group, a company that creates reagents for the biomedical sciences so scientists can conduct groundbreaking science. Visit them at www.ptglab.com to find out more.

The information presented here is not medical advice. Consult your physician for any questions regarding your personal health.

Articles Discussed

Abad et al. Reprogramming in vivo produces teratomas and iPS cells with totipotency features. Nature, 2013.

Ross et al. Depleting myeloid-biased haematopoietic stem cells rejuvenates aged immunity. Nature, 2024.

Ocampo et al. In Vivo Amelioration of Age-Associated Hallmarks by Partial Reprogramming. Cell, 2016.

Wang et al. In vivo partial reprogramming of myofibers promotes muscle regeneration by remodeling the stem cell niche. Nature Communications, 2021.

Browder et al. In vivo partial reprogramming alters age-associated molecular changes during physiological aging in mice. Nature Aging, 2022.

Weindruch et al. The retardation of aging in mice by dietary restriction: longevity, cancer, immunity and lifetime energy intake. Journal of Nutrition, 1986.

Lu et al. Reprogramming to recover youthful epigenetic information and restore vision. Nature, 2020.

Yucel and Gladyshev. The long and winding road of reprogramming-induced rejuvenation. Nature Communications, 2024.

Lopez-Otin et al. The Hallmarks of Aging. Cell, 2013.

Choudhury et al. Proline restores mitochondrial function and reverses aging hallmarks in senescent cells. Cell Reports, 2024.

Zeng et al. Restoration of CPEB4 prevents muscle stem cell senescence during aging. Developmental Cell, 2023.

Disorders of the brain are among the most challenging to treat in all of medicine. Among the challenges is access: the brain is locked away in the skull, preventing medicines from reaching their destination. To deal with this difficulty, researchers are turning to an unexpected access point to the brain: the eye. In today's episode of Beyond the Abstract, Derek and Dan discuss new papers that demonstrate neural and immune links between the eye and the brain that could soon help doctors treat diseases ranging from Alzheimer's to cancer.

Articles discussed

Murdock et al., Multisensory gamma stimulation promotes glymphatic clearance of amyloid. Nature. 2024 (https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-024-07132-6)

Yin et al., Compartmentalized ocular lymphatic system mediates eye-brain immunity. Nature. 2024 (https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-024-07130-8)

The information presented here is not medical advice. Consult your physician for any questions regarding your personal health.

Approximately four in 10 Americans are obese, putting millions at increased risk of developing diabetes, heart disease, liver cancer, and other chronic illnesses. For many years it’s seemed that we’re losing the battle against this modern epidemic. However, the tide may be turning with the recent approval of a revelatory new class of medications. In today’s episode, Dan and Derek dive deep into this new type of treatments. They discuss their discovery, the biology behind them, the pivotal clinical trials showing their efficacy, and the promises and perils of this powerful new tool in the fight against obesity.

Wilding et al. Once-Weekly Semaglutide in Adults with Overweight or Obesity. The New England Journal of Medicine, March 2021. DOI: 10.1056/NEJMoa2032183

The information presented here is not medical advice. Consult your physician for any questions regarding your personal health.

Our episode today takes us Behind The Scenes (BTS) on Beyond The Abstract (BTA). Derek and Dan answer your questions on graduate school on everything from how we chose our research topics, how we deal with imposter syndrome and stress, how it feels to have finished our PhDs, and more! We hope you enjoy this change from our usual format. If you have questions you'd like us to answer, DM us @btapod on Instagram!

This episode is sponsored by Proteintech.

Exercise is good for us - it keeps off the pounds and decreases our risk for heart attack and diabetes. What may be less known about exercise is that it's actually also good for the brain. Exercise improves memory and learning, and may even improve brain function in people with Alzheimer's disease. However, it's not know how exercise might exert these beneficial effects on the brain. In today's episode, Derek and Dan discuss a paper where researchers have identified a molecule called 'clusterin' in blood that seems to improve brain function. They also talk about how Proteintech is contributing to groundbreaking research like this through high quality antibodies and reagents.

De Miguel et al. Exercise plasma boosts memory and dampens brain inflammation via clusterin. Nature, December 2021. DOI: 10.1038/s41586-021-04183-x

The information presented here is not medical advice. Consult your physician on any questions regarding your personal health.

Preeclampsia is a pregnancy disorder characterized by high blood pressure and contributes to significant fetal and maternal deaths. However, what exactly causes preeclampsia is unclear. It's thought that preeclampsia is caused by placental dysfunction - specifically, the ability of specialized fetal cells called trophoblasts to replace and remodel maternal blood vessels. In this episode of Beyond the Abstract, Derek and Dan discuss a new paper that describes how trophoblasts "mimic" blood vessels in order to establish the maternal-fetal connection in the placenta and how this process may go awry in preeclampsia.

Read more about this research in this blog post.

Sung et al. VE-cadherin enables trophoblast endovascular invasion and spiral artery remodeling during placental development. eLife, April 2022. DOI: 10.7554/eLife.77241

The information presented here is not medical advice. Consult your physician on any questions regarding your personal health.

CAR T cells have been engineered to treat everything from cancer to scarring in the heart. However, one major barrier to wide-spread therapy is the fact that T cells have to be removed from the patient, engineered, and then putting them back in the patient. But what if we could create a drug that makes CAR T cells inside a patient's own body? This type of one-size-fits-all approach could be much more efficient. On this episode of Beyond the Abstract, Derek and Dan discuss how scientists at the University of Pennsylvania have successfully created CAR T cells to treat scarring in the heart with the simple injection of a drug. Using state-of-the-art gene therapy, they are able to temporarily transform T cells into soldiers to fight scarring in the heart.

Rurik et al. CAR T cells produced in vivo to treat cardiac injury. Science, January 2022. DOI: 10.1126/science.abm0594

The information presented here is not medical advice. Consult your physician on any questions regarding your personal health.

COVID brain fog is a well-documented, residual symptom following COVID infection. However, how COVID infects the brain and potential causes of COVID brain fog are unclear. In this episode, Dan and Derek discuss two recent studies that show that even mild cases of COVID may have important impacts on brain structure and function.

Douaud et al. SARS-CoV-2 is associated with changes in brain structure in UK Biobank. Nature, March 2022. PMID: 35255491

Fernández-Castañeda et al. Mild respiratory SARS-CoV-2 infection can cause multi-lineage cellular dysregulation and myelin loss in the brain. bioRxiv, January 2022. https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2022.01.07.475453v1

The information presented here is not medical advice. Consult your physician on any questions regarding your personal health.

Epstein-Barr Virus (EBV) is best known for causing mononucleiosis, or the 'kissing disease,' in teenagers. Almost all adults get EBV at some point in their lives, even if they don't get mono. New research shows that EBV infection may have longer-lasting impacts. Using data from the American military, researchers now show that EBV infection drastically increases an individual's risk for multiple sclerosis, a debilitating autoimmune disorder. In this episode, Dan and Derek discuss how these researchers figured this out and potential ways to prevent EBV infection (and potentially multiple sclerosis) altogether.

Bjornevik et al. Longitudinal analysis reveals high prevalence of Epstein-Barr virus associated with multiple sclerosis. Science, January 2022. DOI: 10.1126/science.abj8222

The information presented here is not medical advice. Consult your physician on any questions regarding your personal health.

Hair greying is thought to be an irreversible event related to life stress, but the process has never been extensively studied. For the first time, researchers at Columbia University use novel techniques with hair imaging and a daily diary to demonstrate that hair greying is not only associated with stressful life events, but that the process is reversible and correlated with metabolic changes in mitochondria. Better understanding this process may give us more information on how our bodies biologically respond to psychological stressors and opens new roads to potentially reversing hair greying.

Rosenberg et al. Quantitative mapping of human hair greying and reversal in relation to life stress. eLife, June 2021. DOI: 10.7554/eLife.67437

The information presented here is not medical advice. Consult your physician on any questions regarding your personal health.