A drug that inhibits an enzyme called reverse transcriptase

There is another dog study using a drug that inhibits an enzyme called reverse transcriptase. Anyone knowledgable on the enzyme called reverse transcriptase?

The federally approved drug being tested in the sled dog project is commonly prescribed to people for viral infections.

“Our approach is going to be to give the dogs a reverse transcriptase inhibitor to turn the transcriptase off,” Loftus said, “and hopefully reduce inflammation, reduce the incidence of cancer and other diseases related to mutations and DNA damage, and ideally increase life span.”

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FWIW

Reverse Transcriptase Inhibitors

Patel PH, Zulfiqar H.

Publication Details

Continuing Education Activity

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That is the work of Andrei Gudkov.

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What do you think of the drug that inhibits the enzyme called reverse transcriptase? Has others in the field commented on it?

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I haven’t taken any drug yet - not metformin, not rapa. I look for natural substitutes with similar mode of action. With regard to reverse transcriptase inhibitors, I am reading the following:

Some opinion maker states that quercetin is a good reverse transcriptase inhibitor.

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Rapa is made by a bacteria and is a protein.

Metformin comes from a french lily of some kind.

Neither is very far from its origin.

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from my MASTAH LIST AT The most promising supplements/drugs/small molecules for longevity - akc-important-threads - LongevityBase Forum

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The only thing about the pill form of Rapamycin and Metformin is the packaging. It helps get the good stuff through our digestive system without getting destroyed. Even in the pill form, only 10% of Rapa makes it through. That’s why we use GFJ.

If you took Rapa in it’s natural form, your body would probably absorb only a miniscule amount.

Makes you wonder what other stuff we may be ingesting that could be really good or bad for us if we didn’t break it down digestively.

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Reverse transcriptases are used by viruses such as HIV and hepatitis B to replicate their genomes, by retrotransposon mobile genetic elements to proliferate within the host genome, and by eukaryotic cells to extend the telomeres at the ends of their linear chromosomes.

It might help prevent viral infections, which is what it’s prescribed for. In humans, it would presumably stop the extension of telomeres, which may have an effect on cancer. Do they explain why they think it would reduce inflammation?

I’ve now watched the video & the idea seems implausible to me, especially the thought that reverse transcriptase would have any effect. If he can show it works in mice, I’ll be interested. After all, the world is full of surprising things.

They are conducting a study on retired sled dogs (8-11 years old).

Study seems to have started in November 2019.

He explains his hypothesis in greater detail below.

Video description has chapters so you can jump to the parts of interest. Video first starts with Dr. Kennedy, then a Singaporean scientist.

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Reverse transcriptase inhibitors is getting more attention. Now also at the ARDD 2023.

At 26 minutes in the presentation you posted, he says that aging can be considered a viral disease, driven by the viruses encoded into our DNA. And that 50 % of our DNA consists of incorporated viruses (incorporated 65 to 100 million years ago). And that aging therefore might be counteracted by the use of antiviral approaches. One drug that is mentioned is lamivudine. Doxycycline is also mentioned? It is fascinating that doxycycline + azithromycin and vitamin C recently has got a lot of attention in this forum.

Genomic stability, DNA repair and homeostasis of the proteins, “proteostasis” is a paradigm that look like a root cause of the aging process. A fascinating field that we now might be able to hack with more precision.

This also reminds me of the correlation between the low incidence of Alzheimer’s in persons who take the vaccine against the common flue. “Since there is evidence that several vaccines may protect from Alzheimer’s disease, we are thinking that it isn’t a specific effect of the flu vaccine,”

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