# Partial cell reprogramming could reset aging cells

Markdown copy of https://realalpha.app/s/partial-cell-reprogramming-could-reset-aging-cells/ on Real Alpha, the best minutes from long interviews with the people building AI. Cite and link the page, not this copy.

- Speaker: [David Friedberg](https://realalpha.app/people/david-friedberg/) · David Friedberg is an entrepreneur, investor and podcaster. · Founded The Climate Corporation, sold to Monsanto for about $1.1B in 2013.
- Host: [Chris Williamson](https://realalpha.app/people/chris-williamson/) · Host, Modern Wisdom
- Show: Modern Wisdom
- Episode: [Everything You Know Is About to Collapse - David Friedberg](https://realalpha.app/v/8s2nO_hxbLA/), Apr 13, 2026
- Moment: 44:31 to 52:23 of the episode (8 min), playing on https://realalpha.app/s/partial-cell-reprogramming-could-reset-aging-cells/; the episode from there: https://realalpha.app/v/8s2nO_hxbLA/?t=2671

## Quote

> “we are now discovering not just the four proteins, but a whole bunch of other little molecules that **we can put into a cocktail**.”
> — [David Friedberg](https://realalpha.app/people/david-friedberg/) at [49:46](https://realalpha.app/v/8s2nO_hxbLA/?t=2986) · Modern Wisdom

## Takeaways

1. DNA repair can scramble epigenetic switches over time.
2. Partial exposure may restore a cell’s youthful gene-expression pattern.
3. Early work is local and animal-based; systemic human rejuvenation remains unproven.

## About this segment

David Friedberg explains how partial Yamanaka-factor exposure may reset epigenetic markers without reverting cells to stem cells. Animal results and early trials could shift research from treating diseases to targeting aging.

From “Everything You Know Is About to Collapse - David Friedberg”, Apr 13, 2026. [Watch the full episode](https://realalpha.app/v/8s2nO_hxbLA/)

## Transcript

Transcribed by machine (Whisper) from the episode’s audio, so a word may be off here and there.

[44:36](https://realalpha.app/v/8s2nO_hxbLA/?t=2676) do you think that's one i'm most excited about um so have you looked at yamanaka factors or have you talked about this on your show before uh david sinclair's been on and i know that he's sort of tangentially associated with it, but assume no, do the 30,000 foot view of the Yamanaka factors. So every cell in our body has the same DNA. Okay. We know that. And the DNA is in every cell because of a process called mitosis every time we make a new cell from the time we're in the womb to today we're making new cells both our entire dna gets copied over into every cell but what makes my eye look and act differently than my skin if it's got the same dna how's it different how's it different than my brain or my tongue or my feet they're all they're all those are different cells there's different cells and different organs in the body those cells are

[45:25](https://realalpha.app/v/8s2nO_hxbLA/?t=2725) different because the genes in the dna are on or off so there's a bunch of switches and the switches are either on or off and that creates cellular differentiation it's what makes one cell different from another cell the eye cell different from the heart cell different from the skin cell or the lung cell and the switches that are on or off are these little molecular switches they're molecules that sit on top of the dna and they keep that gene from working it blocks it off and then the other gene is open. And when it's open, that means that your cell is making RNA copies of that gene and turning it into a protein. Zeros and ones. Zeros and ones. And each gene makes a unique protein. The proteins that then come out do a bunch of stuff. They're machines. They're molecular machines. And they're constantly doing all this stuff in your cell. And that's what makes every

[46:15](https://realalpha.app/v/8s2nO_hxbLA/?t=2775) cell different, is what genes are on and what genes are off. And the complexity of this is astounding. If you were to think about a cell being the size of Manhattan, so imagine a cell is a city the size of Manhattan with 500-story tall buildings. That's how big it would be. And every person is a protein. There's 10 billion people living in this 500-story tall building, island of Manhattan, going in between the buildings, up and down, all day long, building stuff together, never sleeping, always working, running into each other, having coffee, making stuff together, breaking stuff together, working 10 billion of us. Those are the proteins in the cell. In one cell, running around doing stuff. For 80 years, that's one second in one cell. That's how complex this is. So the proteins that are on or off matter a lot. And then they

[47:05](https://realalpha.app/v/8s2nO_hxbLA/?t=2825) make stuff. So that's why the eye cell does totally different stuff than the brain cell or the heart cell. As we get older, this is the current science on this. It looks like what happens is we have DNA breaks. DNA gets damaged from radiation and sunlight and bad eating and alcohol and all the other shit. As those DNA breaks happen, your cell actually fixes the DNA. It's very good at fixing it. It goes in, there's a bunch of proteins. They're the worker proteins that are repaired.

[47:30](https://realalpha.app/v/8s2nO_hxbLA/?t=2850) proteins, they go and they fix the DNA. Every time the DNA gets fixed, there's a chance that those ones and zeros, those ons and offs get moved around a little bit. And as they get moved around over time, they get moved to the wrong place. So what ends up happening over time is that the wrong genes get turned on and the right genes can get turned off in a cell. And then that cell stops working right. The eye cell stops doing what it's supposed to be doing. The heart cell stops getting the right electrical cascade to flow through the other cells.

[48:03](https://realalpha.app/v/8s2nO_hxbLA/?t=2883) All of the cells, the skin cell becomes a little wrinkled. And eventually, if enough of those cells have those epigenetic, is what it's called, epigenetic errors, you start getting wrinkles, your heart stops beating as well, you go blind, all these sorts of things happen with aging. It looks like the root of all disease may be aging. And aging is a disease. So it is a disease rooted in the fact that the epigenetic factors, these little molecules, move around in the wrong place.

[48:28](https://realalpha.app/v/8s2nO_hxbLA/?t=2908) That's what we discovered is basically aging. In 2006, a guy named Shinya Yamanaka found that he could take four proteins and put them on a cell. They would go into the cell and they would move all of those epigenetic markers, those ones and zeros, to make that cell into a stem cell, which can then be turned into any other cell in the body. So that was the magic thing he won the Nobel Prize for. In 2016, another scientist published a series of papers showing that instead of putting a lot of those four proteins on the cell you could put a small amount and if you put a small amount instead of resetting all those molecular markers and making that cell back into a stem cell what it actually does it just moves those markers back to where they're supposed to be to make it a young cell and suddenly that retinal cell becomes like a young retinal cell the skin cell becomes a young

[49:16](https://realalpha.app/v/8s2nO_hxbLA/?t=2956) skin cell the heart cell becomes a young heart cell all of these cells get reset and they did this in mice and they made the mice age to like 250 plus years old they put it in monkeys the wrinkles went away and they've done it in um specifically applying it to retinal cells in the eye and reverse blindness this is sinclair's stuff right sinclair has one of these companies that's in clinical trials now and there's dozens of others altos labs is like one of the most funded startups in history that no one talks about um they've raised you know close to probably 10 billion dollars at this point uh to pursue these technologies but basically what this means is we are now discovering not just the four proteins, but a whole bunch of other little molecules that we can put into a cocktail.

[49:56](https://realalpha.app/v/8s2nO_hxbLA/?t=2996) Either we're going to drink it, take it as a shot. or take it as a pill, it will get into our cells, and it will reset the epigenetic of that cell to make it young again. They're starting with targeting diseases, like a particular, like blindness or glaucoma in the eye, or, you know, rheumatoid arthritis, or some other heart issue, and they're applying these factors to the cells in that tissue only.

[50:19](https://realalpha.app/v/8s2nO_hxbLA/?t=3019) Locally. Locally. But over time, what will end up happening is this becomes a systemic treatment, and they're already doing it in animal models. And then you can either do it continuously, or what I think will end up happening is we'll probably have a system whereby these factors will be continuous. When I say the word factor, I mean protein. These proteins can be continuously made and released inside our body as they're needed.

[50:42](https://realalpha.app/v/8s2nO_hxbLA/?t=3042) So we maintain our youth and we will live theoretically for as long as we want. That's where this is headed. And the technology shows now that we can do this in animals. We can re-dose them, re-dose them and keep them young. Has it been done systemically yet? Yeah, this is the mouse. the mouse model where they made these mice the equivalent of like having someone live like 200 plus years old you know and this is like so early they haven't even optimized the molecules they haven't optimized how you deliver the molecules they haven't optimized the dosing they haven't optimized the method of the dose like there's all these techniques that are going to be developed on top of this for every one year we can extend average human lifespan we're adding tens of trillions of dollars to gdp right so this is also another big economic driver but it's not just how

[51:25](https://realalpha.app/v/8s2nO_hxbLA/?t=3085) long people live it's how healthy they are and how energetic they are and how happy they can be and they can now go out and not feel all the pain and have the disease you know theoretically this can lead to a reversal in rates of cancer proliferation or reversal in diabetes or reversal in many of these other diseases that are fundamentally rooted in this kind of failure of your epigenome the the markers that are turn your genes on and off so this is a technology category that I am like, I think is one of these other things that you can kind of think about the compounding effect free energy, right, like AI automation. And, you know, infinite labor for people to do all the things they want to do, and potentially living forever. I mean, you start to think about how these all kind of compound, that's why I'm excited about the future. Like these very

[52:12](https://realalpha.app/v/8s2nO_hxbLA/?t=3132) quickly become these sort of compounding effects that drive us into a happier tomorrow. And then again it becomes a question of abundance how do you want to spend your time you know again 100