The report of Chinese researchers, published in the journal Nature a couple of months ago, became a small sensation: scientists allegedly unraveled the reason why organisms age, according to Pannochka, an online publication for girls and women from 14 to 35 years old.. net Now an international team led by experts from the University of Bonn has debunked the main points of this article.

The causes of aging remain a mystery.

The findings of Chinese researchers surprised the scientific community. Using simple measurements on young nematode worms, they supposedly could predict how long they would live.. The scientists used the cpYFP fluorescent sensor in mitochondria, the powerhouses of cells that are present in most living organisms.. They provide energy for all life processes..

Many biologists believe that mitochondria are the biological clock that controls the aging of the body.. Under the suspicion of scientists are highly active molecules, free radicals that are released during energy production and can damage cellular structures. As a result, the performance of the cell decreases until it dies..

This theory is not new - it was first proposed back in the 1970s.. However, until today, no one has been able to prove the link between mitochondrial activity, energy production and cell aging..

Dr. En-Zhi Shen and colleagues seemed to have found the missing link. They used cpYFP as a free radical detector. If you believe their data, then the more often the sensor lit up in young worms (that is, the more energy they produced), the shorter their life was..

Now an international team of researchers has refuted the basic claims of their Chinese counterparts.. Their work showed that cpYFP is not really capable of measuring free radical levels..

It turned out that the sensor signals were caused by the usual change in the pH of the medium inside the mitochondria, and they do not give anything significant..

Thus, scientists have not yet come to unravel the mystery of cellular aging..

The results of this new study are published in the same journal Nature.. 28 experts from 9 countries were involved in a massive effort led by staff from the University of Bonn, the German Cancer Center Heidelberg and the UK Medical Research Council.

medbe. en.