Monkeys received a Brain boost thanks to one shot of a blood product

The effect of a single injection of klotho on cognition in older monkeys is related to how the blood-brain barrier improves cognitive function

The study found that a single injection of klotho led to some improvements in cognitive function in older monkeys and lasted for two weeks. The researchers think that a study of the rejuvenation of brain function in older adults could be done with the help of theprotein.

It is still unclear exactly how injecting klotho has this effect on cognition or why it lasts this long. Dubal says that uncovering the mechanism of a blood-brain barrier is a matter of finding intermediates. She says there’s a strong reason to take part in human clinical trials now.

Produced by the kidney, klotho circulates in the blood and has been linked to health and lifespan. Orson Moe, a kidney specialist and professor of internal medicine at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, describes it as a housekeeper that helps regulate the kidneys and metabolism. “It protects us and keeps us healthy,” he says.

In people, having more of the protein seems to carry health benefits. Some people have more klotho than others, even though it decreases with age. In a 2014 paper, Dubal and her colleagues studied more than 700 participants ages 52 to 85. People with higher levels of the proteins performed well on thinking and memory tests, such as naming a word in a different color, and drawing a picture.

For that study, the team also engineered mice to have higher than normal levels of the protein—these mice performed better on maze tests than normal mice.

It is suggested that this could suggest applications for treating human cognitive disorders, given the close genetics and similarities between primate and humans.

Study co-author Dena Dubal, a physician-researcher at the University of California, San Francisco, compares the test to recalling where you left your car in a car park, or remembering a sequence of numbers a couple of minutes after hearing it. Such tasks become harder with age.

Improved monkey tests using klotho before and after injections using the spermatozoa complex – evidence of a nuanced mode of actions

The monkeys performed significantly better in these tests after receiving klotho — before the injections they identified the correct wells around 45% of the time, compared with around 60% of the time after injection. The improvement was sustained for at least two weeks. Unlike in previous studies involving mice, low amounts of klotho were effective. This adds an element of complexity to the findings, which suggests a more nuanced mode of actions than was previously thought, Busche says.