Quercetin and Dasatinib. Senescent cells
With age, all body tissues accumulate senescent cells, which secrete destructive enzymes and inflammatory proteins that affect nearby healthy cells. Senolytic drugs eliminate these deteriorated cells, leaving room for new cells to replace them. The idea is that removing senescent cells from a tissue will improve its function.
Senolytic agents are derived from natural products, some of which are aimed at inhibiting the pro-survival pathways that make it possible for these cells to resist apoptosis, i.e. programmed cell death. Among these agents, known for their goodness in combating senescence, or cellular aging, we have quercetin and dasatinib.
Quercetin is a flavonoid used in dietetics present in many vegetables, in addition to tea and red wine. in some varieties of onion, it can represent up to 10% of its dry weight and has many promising therapeutic activities.
It is considered to have various biological activities such as antioxidant, anticarcinogenic, antiviral, antibacterial, anti-inflammatory and prevents cardiovascular diseases. It is therefore currently used as a nutritional supplement and phytochemical remedy for a wide range of diseases such as obesity, diabetes, and circulatory dysfunction, as well as to treat mood-related disorders.
Quercetin is a natural compound that acts as an antihistamine and anti-inflammatory and eliminates human senescent endothelial cells and mouse bone marrow stem cells.
Dasatinib is a tyrosine kinase inhibitor developed by the pharmaceutical industry as an alternative to the highly successful imatinib for the treatment of chronic myeloid leukemia when resistance develops. It works by blocking the action of an abnormal protein that signals cancer cells to multiply. This helps stop the spread of cancer cells.
Dasatinib is also used to treat a certain type of acute lymphoblastic leukemia, a type of cancer of the white blood cells in people who can no longer benefit from other leukemia drugs or who cannot take these drugs because of side effects.
The Kirkland group named these compounds senolytics.
When Kirkland's group identified these compounds with senolytic activity, they did not stop at demonstrating their activity in cell culture but used them in animals that they irradiated (a treatment that causes tissue aging, as many cancer patients will attest), in mice that they allowed to age naturally, or in a genetic model of premature aging or progeria. In all these models, the combined treatment of quercetin and dasatinib showed that the animals were more protected from the effects related to aging pathologies.