100 | SEPTEMBER 26 • 2019
Health | Israel’s role
Pressing Pause?
Study could extend biological clock.
W
hen age 30
approaches, many
women start paying
attention to their biological
clocks and their chances to
conceive. Indeed, human eggs
begin to mature from the
onset of a woman’
s first period
(usually between ages 10-15).
As years pass, the eggs age and
their quality decreases.
“The critical age is 35,” said
Dr. Yonatan Tzur, a research-
er at the Hebrew University
of Jerusalem’
s Genetic
Department, in a phone inter-
view with the Times of Israel.
“From then on, the quality
of eggs drops fast,” making it
much harder for women to
conceive. Older egg cells are
also the main cause of birth
defects and miscarriages.
While in vitro fertilization
(IVF) techniques allow doc-
tors to select the best eggs,
women older than 35 have
a harder time producing a
healthy baby with their own
eggs and, for women 40
years or older, the success of
IVF goes down significantly,
prompting women to use
donor eggs.
This, along with the fact
the average age of first-time
mothers in the Western world
is increasing sharply, makes
finding a way to slow down egg
maturation crucial.
What if women could press
pause on their biological clocks?
What if there were a way to
delay the deterioration of egg
quality? Tzur and his team
embarked on a quest to find
the mechanisms that control
ovarian development and egg
cell aging, the Times of Israel
story said.
In a study published in the
scientific journal Genetics,
Tsur and associate Dr. Hanna
Achache, along with scientists
at Harvard Medical School, say
they have discovered the switch
that may do just this — in
roundworms.
They are hopeful this break-
through may help women
extend their fertility windows
and maintain high egg quality
into their 30s and 40s.
In studying the worms, they
found a biochemical MAPK
switch, which has a role in
activating or switching off var-
ious developmental processes;
humans also have the switch,
Achache said. “But we don’
t
know when it turns on and off
and what activates this,” so the
research is still at a very early
stage.
Once the equivalent of the
activator ogr-2 gene found in
worms to control the rhythm
of egg maturation is found in
humans, she said, perhaps a
food additive could be devised
that increases its activity.
Or during IVF procedures,
the MAPK switch could be
manipulated to make it more
receptive to sperm, just like a
younger egg is, she said. This
could improve women’
s chances
of having healthy babies as they
get older.
Dr. Hanna Achache
and Dr. Yonatan Tzur
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