Researchers at Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University have prevented the livers of mice from aging by engineering mice in which the cellular cleaning machinery is stopped from breaking down, thus blocking buildup of damaged proteins.

They developed mice with an extra copy of the gene that codes for a receptor protein that lets chaperone molecules dock with enzyme-filled compartments called lysosomes, where the unwanted protein molecules are recycled.

The hope is that diet or a drug to stop the existing receptor proteins breaking down could have the same effect. It would benefit other organs, such as the brain.