Blood Transfusions from Young Mice to Old Improve Brain Function

[TECH NEWS]

A research team from Stanford University has found that injecting the blood of young mice into older mice can cause new neural development and improved memory. Team leader Saul Villeda presented the group’s findings at this year’s Society for Neuroscience conference. The researchers were following up on work by another team also led by Villeda that last year found that when younger mice were given transfusions of blood from older mice, their mental faculties aged more quickly than non-transfused young mice. In their paper published in the journal Nature, the team also noted that the reverse appeared to be true as well: the older mice derived a degree of mental benefit from the transfusions. In this new research, the team connected the bloodstreams of an older and a younger mouse, allowing their blood to comingle. Subsequent brain scans found that the number of neural stem cells in the brains of the older mice increased by 20 percent after just a few days, indicating that new neural connections were being made—a necessary occurrence for increased memory retention.

 October 19, Bob Yirka / medicalxpress.com