 The global scientific community has been trying to cure cancer for decades, with great progress in many respects, but we're still far from the ultimate goal of curing all cancer types at all stages. And even if we do cure all cancer types at all stages, experts estimate this will only add about two to three years of life expectancy due to other age-related diseases such as heart disease. Nevertheless, we still of course desperately want to cure cancer, and South Korean researchers have recently developed a phototherapy technology to selectively destroy cancer cells leaving surrounding healthy tissue unharmed. We'll have this story and more in this episode of Lifespan News. Welcome to Lifespan News on X10, your source for longevity science updates. I'm your host, Brent Nally. If you missed our last episode, then you can watch it by clicking the card above. We encourage you to check the description below for links to these stories. So continuing with our first story, phototherapy isn't new. Phototherapy works by injecting patients with a photosensitizer that accumulates only in cancer cells. Patients are then exposed to laser light, which activates the substance, killing cancer cells. However, conventional photosensitizers are effective only for one session, meaning that injections need to be reapplied each time. In addition, the substance tends to accumulate in the skin or eyes of the patients, causing side effects upon light exposure. For these reasons, patients are generally recommended to isolate from light sources for some time after the treatment. The new photosensitizer developed by South Korean scientists has been demonstrated to be not only highly specific to cancer cells only, but also long-lived, in that its effects can last up to four weeks after injection. In mice with implanted tumors, the compound allowed researchers to fully remove the tumor with no side effects to surrounding tissues. This was done with a single injection and repeated exposures to light. Researchers expect their compound to be very useful for the future of cancer phototherapy, but it remains to be seen how it will work in humans. For our next story, AI identifies senescent cells and tests new drugs. Scientists have created a neural network that can identify senescent cells based on their shape. We usually talk about senescence in terms of a cell's operation and chemical output, but senescence also changes the cell's morphology. For instance, healthy epithelial cells are elongated but become rounder when senescent. The researchers generated images of healthy and senescent cells, then trained a neural network to discriminate between them. The researchers achieved an accuracy of around 90% and the model was able to recognize senescent cells even if they were from a different tissue than it was trained on. This could be useful for screening drugs since a neural network could be used to quickly and accurately measure the amount of senescent cells in a treated sample. We encourage you to subscribe to our new X10 YouTube channel. Once you're subscribed, be sure to click the notification bell and select all notifications to ensure you don't miss any videos. Now, back to the news. Alpha Keta Gluterate Delays Age-Related Fertility Decline Alpha Keta Gluterate, or AKG, is a popular dietary and sports supplement frequently used in the bodybuilding world. AKG has recently become of interest to the longevity community because of evidence that AKG might slow down aging. Earlier studies have shown that AKG declines in age in humans. So researchers wanted to find out if boosting AKG could slow down the aging process. The researchers added AKG to the drinking water of mice and monitored how that affected their aging. Mice treated with AKG retained functional ovaries for longer and had more eggs which were also of higher quality. The AKG treatment also seems to have reduced telomere attrition and mTOR signaling. The effects of AKG seem to largely be mediated by the mitochondria, so it seems to link energy metabolism and lifespan. These are promising results and we look forward to seeing how research builds on them. If you want to learn more, check the link in the description below. For our next story, researchers have discovered a genetic pathway for preventing hearing loss. Activation of a genetic pathway controlled by the NRF2 gene reduces age-related hearing loss, according to a new study. In the long run, drugs or treatments that target this pathway could help us keep our hearing sharp as we get older. Age-related hearing loss is extremely common, often beginning with the ability to detect higher frequencies and progressing to trouble with mid-frequency sounds. Since conversation consists predominantly of mid-range frequencies, this can make it difficult to follow what's being said, thus reducing the quality of life of elderly people. Researchers engineered mice to have higher expression of the NRF2 gene, which has been linked with age-related hearing loss. As these mice age, they were better than their wild-type counterparts at hearing mid and low frequencies. This is a starting point towards interventions that could delay or prevent age-related hearing loss. But there are still lots of questions. Why isn't high-frequency hearing loss affected? How is NRF2 linked to hearing loss? And does any of this hold true in humans? So as with most of our stories, they're ongoing and we'll be sure to share updates as they occur. For our final story, we're investigating the link between COVID-19 and telomeres. Researchers at the Spanish National Cancer Center, or CNIO, recently ran a small study to investigate a possible link between the severity of COVID-19 and telomere shortening. Telomeres are the protective segments of DNA found at the end of DNA strands, and they're known to shorten with age. Telomere shortening is a hallmark of aging, and it's suspected to be a cause of age-related diseases. As COVID-19 is disproportionately more severe in the elderly, but almost not at all in children, scientists suspect that the processes of aging may play a crucial role in an individual's vulnerability to COVID-19. There's evidence suggesting that COVID-19 stresses regenerative capabilities to the point where cell turnover has significantly increased, and thus, so has telomere shortening. To investigate this possible link, CNIO researchers took blood samples from 61 female and 21 male COVID-19 patients between the ages of 29 and 85. The researchers, led by Dr. Maria Blasco, assessed the severity of their symptoms, and then measured the length of their blood lymphocytes telomeres using three different methods, and found good agreement across all the three. In particular, one of the methods was used to measure average telomere length, percentage of short telomeres, and rate of shortening. The results seem to confirm previous studies and show a correlation between these three variables in the COVID-19 severity score of the patients. However, the study found that age was more strongly correlated with symptom severity than telomere length, suggesting that other aging processes may be involved too. The sample size in the study was small, so it's too early to tell whether its findings can be generalized to a larger population. That's all the news for this video. Before you go, there's a few quick, free, and simple things that you can do to help us solve the human aging problem. If you haven't already, please like this video, share this video on your social media to help spread the word about our new X10 YouTube channel. Make sure you're subscribed with a bell turned all notifications to ensure you don't miss any videos. Is there a recent life extension story that you think we should have included in one of our videos but haven't? In which of these stories from this video excited you the most? Let us know what you think in the comments below. We really appreciate it, and we look forward to seeing you in the next video at least as healthy as you are now.