As people get older and gain extra weight, their body’s cells start to experience a kind of stress. This stress is due to too much of a chemical called ROS (reactive oxygen species).
It can cause problems in the cells and increase the chances of getting diabetes. It also changes the body’s good “brown” fat into not-so-good “white” fat, which can lead to obesity.
Another issue it causes is the buildup of unwanted fat in the liver. In Denmark, for example, about a quarter of the population has this problem, known as fatty liver, which can lead to serious liver issues and even death.
Professor Simon Bekker-Jensen from the University of Copenhagen has been looking into what causes these health problems to get worse.
His research, published in the journal Science, is titled “ROS-induced ribosome impairment underlies ZAKα-mediated metabolic decline in obesity and aging.”
He found out that a protein called ZAK-alpha is like an alarm signal for the body’s metabolism. When cells are stressed, ZAK-alpha tells the rest of the body, and this can lead to fatty liver among other issues.
Fatty liver is the most common liver disease worldwide and can get worse over time, leading to cirrhosis and liver failure.
The only way to treat cirrhosis is by getting a liver transplant. In Denmark, about 700 people die each year because of this.
The exciting part of Professor Bekker-Jensen’s research is that they found a way to stop these problems from happening.
By removing the ZAK-alpha protein, they could prevent aging and obesity from turning into metabolic diseases. This was tested on mice and zebrafish, and the results were very promising.
Mice without the ZAK-alpha protein were healthier, more active, had stronger muscles, and didn’t develop the same metabolic diseases that are common in humans.
Professor Bekker-Jensen points out that mice are a good way to study human metabolism because they react to unhealthy lifestyles much like people do.
They can become overweight and develop similar diseases when given a poor diet and no exercise.
This research could lead to new medicines for treating and preventing diseases caused by aging and obesity. While there are already good medicines for diabetes, fatty liver is still a big problem with no easy solution.
The professor believes that because ZAK-alpha is a known drug target, many companies working on medicines for metabolic diseases might be interested in this research.
The next step is to do clinical studies with people, and there’s already a lot of interest from doctors in this area. This discovery could mean a big step forward in treating some of the major health problems that come with aging and weight gain.
If you care about wellness, please read studies about how ultra-processed foods and red meat influence your longevity, and why seafood may boost healthy aging.
For more information about wellness, please see recent studies that olive oil may help you live longer, and vitamin D could help lower the risk of autoimmune diseases.
The research findings can be found in Science.
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