Great excitement today at DC Action – the patient support group for dyskeratosis congenita and telomere repair defects; a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine has shown that Danazol, a cheap and widely available medication, can reverse the shortening of telomeres that leads to the premature aging responsible for their illness.
Champagne corks may not yet be popping down at DCaction.org (short telomeres in dyskeratosis congenita cause cirrhosis of the liver, as well as a variety of other nasty complications) but those of you who want to Iive forever may be interested to know that longer telomeres are associated with ‘younger’ chromosomes and better life expectancy.
To find out more, make sure you read the paper, Telomeres on Steroids – Turning Back the Mitotic Clock? by Peter M. Lansdorp, M.D., Ph.D, here.