New research highlights potential brain ageing insights

Researchers have gained new insight into the way that cells in the brain age, a process that was previously unknown due to the fact that these cells do not have the ability to divide.

It was previously known that DNA damage responses can re-program senescent fibroblasts – the cells which divide in the skin to repair wounds – to produce and secrete a host of dangerous substances, which damage other surrounding cells.

Because neurons are non-proliferating, it was thought that they would follow a completely different pathway, but the Newcastle University study revealed they in fact follow the exact same rules as senescent fibroblasts.

This could open the field for new insights into the development of dementia, motor neuron disease or age-related hearing loss.

Newcastle University's Professor Thomas von Zglinicki, who led the research, said: "We will now need to find out whether the same mechanisms we detected in mouse brains are also associated with brain ageing and cognitive loss in humans. We might have opened up a shortcut towards understanding brain ageing."

In England alone, there are currently 570,000 people living with dementia, a total that is expected to double over the next 30 years.