Stem cells may be the key to staying strong in old age
As early as your mid 30's, the size and strength of your muscles begins to decline. The changes are subtle to start -- activities that once came easily are not so easy now -- but by your 70's or 80's, this decline can leave you frail and reliant on others even for simple daily tasks. While the speed of decline varies from person to person and may be slowed by diet and exercise, virtually no one completely escapes the decline. "Even an elite trained athlete, who has high absolute muscle strength will still experience a decline with age," said study author Joe Chakkalakal, Ph.D., assistant professor of Orthopaedics in the Center for Musculoskeletal Research at URMC. Chakkalakal has been investigating exactly how muscle loss occurs in aging mice in order to figure out how humans might avoid it. In a study, published today in eLife , Chakkalakal and lead author Wenxuan Liu, Ph.D., recent graduate of the Biomedical Genetics Department at URMC, define a new rol...