(Web Desk) - A team of Chinese scientists claim they've figured out a way to reverse ageing in a giant leap towards human immortality.
The chance to become a real-life Benjamin Button could become reality as the new anti-ageing therapy effectively rewinds the ageing process, according to researchers.
And the scientists claim it could potentially prevent serious diseases like Alzheimer's.
The technology revolves around hydrogen atoms and how they can help to slow down and turn the clock back on everyone's inevitable fear of getting old.
Hydrogen has long been theorised to be key to turning back the clock - with tests showing it has anti-inflammatory effects.
It was once described as the "holy grail" of anti-ageing - if scientists could finally crack how to use it.
Now, a Chinese group, writing in the journal Nature Communications, have claimed they solved the ancient puzzle.
Their intriguing plan will see them safely deliver a high concentration of hydrogen molecules over a long period of time so the molecules can produce a therapeutic effect.
Using nanotechnology, the experts developed a scaffold implant that looks to send direct hydrogen to a person with a whopping 40,000 times more efficacy than other methods.
In the past, people have believed that drinking hydrogen-rich water or inhaling hydrogen gas could make them stop ageing but never found long term success.
According to the paper published, the implant will deliver a slow and consistent release of hydrogen for up to a week - much higher than the 30 minute limit that hydrogen-rich water gives you.
The study found the long-term treatment helped repair bone defects in older mice who were the equivalent age of a 70-year-old human.
Going off the results of the study, the scaffold released hydrogen for up to nine days after it was first administered, in the longest case ever recorded using the same method.
Corresponding author He Qianjun, from Shanghai Jiao Tong University said: “We believe that continuous hydrogen supply will be a universal anti-ageing technology that can treat various ageing-related diseases, including preventing and treating diseases like Alzheimer’s."
Hydrogen essentially acts as an anti-inflammatory agent that destroys any toxic particles on the skin that cause ageing.
The lightest of all gases has been found to have a universal revitalising impact on several cells and tissues in the human body.
The two main obstacles that cause us to age is the inflammation of cells and the loss of our bodies' regenerative ability when we get older.
Research found that not only does the therapy "remodel" your bodies ability to solve many of the anti-ageing processes by changing it's declining environment but also have a “continuing effect on later bone repair”.
Qianjun went on to tell the South China Morning Post that the team’s next big challenge is to increase the time the hydrogen lasts.
That nine day period has been seen as a huge improvement to previous work, the researchers claim.
And an even longer period of release would make it one of the biggest scientific breakthroughs in recent years.
A lot more research is needed before anything like this is actually put to the test on humans but the increased development of high-performance materials that deliver hydrogen is “crucial”.
In the past boffins at Nottingham University found a specific protein inside a certain part of cells which seems to be the cause of ageing.
The discovery of the protein, called carbonic anhydrase, could lead to the development of new medicines to slow the effects of ageing - or even halt the progression of debilitating conditions such as dementia.