Drugs that could help people to live to 150 by slowing the ageing process may soon be available at drug stores.
The drugs are synthetic versions of resveratrol, an organic chemical found in red wine and believed to have an anti-ageing effect by boosting activity of a protein called SIRT1. Resveratrol is found in the skin of red grapes.
Pharmaceutical firm GSK is testing the drugs on patients with Type 2 diabetes and psoriasis, a serious skin condition, the Telegraph reported.
David Sinclair, professor of genetics at Harvard University, said ageing might not actually be an "irreversible affliction".
He explained that increasing SIRT1 activity improved how well our cells operated, making them less sluggish. Previous experiments have shown that mice, bees and flies given the SIRT1-boosting compounds lived longer. Writing in the journal Science, Sinclair claimed that they performed experiments that showed these resveratrol-based compounds were having a direct effect on health.
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