In 2020, AgelessRx and Dr. James P Watson at UCLA joined forces to inaugurate an innovative clinical study (PEARL) to look into the impact of Rapamycin on human longevity.
Keep reading on if you’d like to explore more about Rapamycin for longevity and its influence on the aging process or would just like to look into PEARL.
What is Rapamycin?
Also well known as Rapamume, or Sirolimus, Rapamycin is an immunosuppressant drug with FDA approval. Rapamycin is commonly administered in transplant patients for preventing organ rejection. Rapamycin can suppress the immune system at high doses but is thought to assist in aging delay and reversal with intermittent dosing.
Emerging from bacteria discovered on Easter Island, initial investigations into Rapamycin suggest that it possesses immunity boosting, as well as glucose and insulin regulation properties at different dosage patterns. However, Rapamycin’s optimal dosage still hasn’t been identified, and that is where the PEARL clinical trial comes in.
How is the aging process influenced by Rapamycin?
Rapamycin contains mTOR inhibition properties. mTOR connects with other protein complexes, mTOR complex 1 (TORC1) and mTOR complex 2 (TORC2), which are responsible for the regulation of various cellular processes. Rapamycin promotes cell conversion and growth by inhibiting mTOR. Mikhail V. Blagosklonny suggested that “Rapamycin slows development and aging, reproduction and menopause, and hyperfunction and functional decline.” Initial investigations point towards the result that Rapamycin can effectively boost the life expectancy of rodents by reducing overall body weight, enhancing cardiovascular and bone health, and rebalancing their microbiome (the aggregate of the total microbiota living on or inside animal tissues).
Matt Kaeberlein, Ph.D., who is a professor at the University of Washington, went on record with the statement: “The drug Rapamycin is currently the most effective and reproducible pharmacological approval for directly targeting the aging process to increase life span and health span in laboratory animals. Rapamycin positively impacts most hallmarks of aging and it has been shown to increase lifespan in each major invertebrate model organism and in rodents. Rapamycin increases lifespan by 10 to 20% in multiple strains of mice.”
The PEARL clinical trial marks the first large-scale study aimed at exploring the impact of Rapamycin on human longevity.
What is PEARL?
PEARL is short for Participatory Evaluation of Aging with Rapamycin for Longevity. In collaboration with the University of California, AgelessRx is gearing up to introduce this innovative, economical, and revolutionary scientific investigation to explore the efficacy and safety of Rapamycin for longevity in healthy adults.
The PEARL trial is randomized, double-blind, and placebo controlled. Notably, PEARL is also a first-in-class nationwide telemedicine trial and can be considered as a pilot large-scale investigation on human longevity.
PEARL will be investigating 4 different dosing regimens to identify the safest and most effective dose.
Is enrollment for PEARL open at the moment?
Yes! AgelessRx is currently in the process of enrolling about 200-400 healthy adults (aged 50 or older) for up to 365 days, with further plans to carry out the study for even longer. All enrolled participants will be put in one of the specific dosage or placebo control groups.
Throughout the course of the trial, every participant will receive various tests amounting to over $3,000 and will also be medically evaluated.
