The cell’s power and repair
Vincenzo Sorrentino is an aging biologist at the National University of Singapore, part of the city’s remarkable longevity cluster around Brian Kennedy. His science sits where the cell makes its energy and keeps its proteins in order — mitochondria, energy metabolism, and the quality control that stops proteins from misfolding as we age.
He first made his name showing that “energy boosters” — interventions that improve mitochondrial function — could reduce age-associated amyloid, the sticky protein aggregates of aging, even in the muscles of old mice. That points to a bigger idea he is chasing now: catching protein aggregation before it becomes disease, and finding compounds that help cells fold, clear and repair.
It is patient, mechanistic work, and he is refreshingly open about the path from lab to life: screen candidates in worms, validate the best in mice, and — ideally using drugs already in the FDA library — work out whether they can help humans. Much of this he does hand-in-hand with his friend and collaborator Jan Gruber, whose worm-screening platform pairs neatly with Vincenzo’s biology.
What stayed with us on the walk was his spirit about the whole endeavour. Aging, he says, is complex but fascinating — a live discovery that everyone can take part in, not just a handful of scientists. It needs biologists, engineers and ordinary people to learn about it and talk about it together.
