I see Bryan Johnson is now using GH for the purpose of thymus rejuvenation.
Has anyone looked at other treatments for this?
What about Thymic Protein A (ProBoost)? I read this:
The main problem with this age related shrinkage and decline in the functioning of the thymus gland is that it decreases the body’s ability to fight off infectious diseases, autoimmune diseases, and cancer. Indeed the atrophy of the thymus is in fact one of the key bio-markers of aging, and as such should be addressed as an absolute priority by any serious life extensionist. What Dr. Beardsley has given us with his discovery of Thymic Protein A is currently the absolute number one supplement for dealing with the decline of the thymus gland. Thymic Protein A is a complete 500-amino chain protein that fits into the receptor sites on T-4 cells to “turn on” and program the cells for their disease-fighting functions. The product is in powder form and is taken sublingually (under the tongue). In less than 60 seconds, ProBoost®’s 12 trillion molecules of Thymic Protein A begin to dissolve and rapidly go to work to boost your immune system. It rapidly metabolizes within the body, supporting and strengthening immunity by activating and increasing immune-boosting white blood cells.
The active ingredient in ProBoost® is Thymic Protein A, a critical protein naturally produced by the thymus gland and responsible to program the body’s T-cells to stimulate an immune system response. Each of the 12 trillion molecules of Thymic Protein A in a single packet of ProBoost® contain an important transmitter which seeks out the CD-4 helper white blood cell and attaches to it to activate the cell. The CD-4 helper cells, after they are formed, are NOT fully functional unless they come into direct contact with Thymic Protein A. The CD-4 helper cell controls critical effector cells, including CD-8 killer cells and CD-8 suppressor cells, by secreting chemical messengers called cytokines such as interleukin-2 and interferon. When the body has a sufficient amount of properly working CD-4 cells, adequate amounts of cytokines are created to allow the entire system to function properly.
And certain parts of the thymus shrink with chronic (daily) rapamycin use in mice, which makes sense as it is an immune suppressant. “RAPA caused significant thymic atrophy.” The effect of rapamycin on T cell development in mice - PubMed It does appear the thymus size does bounce back with intermittent use in mice after about two weeks (which equates to a lot longer in humans).
This raises the question in my mind of how important the thymus is for longevity if mice chronically treated with Rapa also live longer (although they are not exposed to a lot of immune system challenges in the lab settings in which these trials are done.)
This subject of thymic atrophy with rapamycin use is of concern if anyone who knows more about it would care to weigh in.
Yes, he seems to be doing the protocol that Greg Fahy developed and initially trialed on a small group of people, and is now doing a second larger trial.
While the first study seems to have been somewhat successful, The Buck Institute has done a study on aging clocks and Eric Verdin has posited that the results that Greg Fahy announced with the first trial may be a false positive because of how the bioclock used measured things inaccurately.
Yes, I find this rather worrisome. Note that everolimus is used as part of the treatment of certain thymic tumors.
I’m not convinced that manipulating the somatotrophic axis can give adequate thymic growth for significant life extension. IMO the best monotherapies along these lines are oral ghrelin analogues. I use MK-677 every other day during every other rapa cycle. This is certainly not ideal, and may even be harmful.
Does anyone have thoughts on whether eating the thymus gland (sweetbreads) or taking a glandular thymus supplement might be helpful or would that fall in the category of folklore? Sorry if that’s a silly question but I’m genuinely curious.
That’s a very interesting paper actually but note that the dosage of both metformin and Korean red ginseng used was… gulp… 200 mg/kg. If you scale it linearly for humans it would be an intolerable metformin dose and who knows what that much KRG would do or if anyone would even bother taking it.
The human equivalent dose for a 60kg human would be 1000mg (per day), using the usual 12x metabolic rate adjustment. The maximum metformin dosage in humans is 1000mg 2x/day (or 500mg 5x/day) and I take 500mg 2x/day (though my weight is 65kg).
The serving size for the standard Korean Red Ginseng concentrate is 1g (1-3x/day) and I usually take 2 servings per day.
Of course the paper implies that you need to take either Metformin or Korean Red Ginseng since you were young to avoid Thymus involution, so it is not clear if Thymus involution can be reversed once it has already happened.
My thymus should be okay. I take 2.125g of ‘instant release’ metformin spread throughout the day and I weigh 60.5kg. Maybe I should take less metformin, I didn’t realise
“The maximum metformin dosage in humans is 1000mg 2x/day”
The maximum daily dosage of Metformin in USA is 2500mg in 500mg capsules (or 2 x 1000mg capsules, or 3 x 750mg capsules). Some countries have 850mg capsules and allow 3 x 850mg/day.
Strictly speaking all drugs should be dosed based on body weight to achieve a target blood or tissue concentration : It was common practice until 50 years ago to custom compound all prescriptions. Current pharmacy practice makes that all but impossible, though compounding pharmacies still exist in USA for those willing to pay extra.
