Nature reviews. Drug discoverySep 7, 2026

New treatments to build muscle and support healthy aging

Longevity & Aging Weekly Brief ↗PubMed ↗DOI ↗

Updated Sep 9, 2026

Abstract

Millions of people worldwide suffer from sarcopenia, a syndrome characterized by age-related loss of muscle mass and strength.

Sarcopenia is associated with reduced mobility, increased falls and fractures, and higher mortality risk.
Current therapies are lacking due to the complex causes of the syndrome, emphasizing the need for multifunctional treatments.
Understanding the mechanisms behind muscle wasting may inform pharmacological interventions aimed at increasing muscle strength.
Potential treatments include promoting mitochondrial function, restoring autophagy, enhancing anabolic signaling, and reducing inflammation.
Recent clinical trials are exploring the combination of weight loss drugs with therapies that preserve muscle tissue.

Simplified

Millions of people worldwide suffer from sarcopenia, a clinically recognized syndrome that is defined as the age-related loss of skeletal muscle mass and strength. Sarcopenia reduces mobility, leads to falls and fractures, and increases the risk of death, posing an ever-increasing health-care and economic burden to society. There are currently no approved therapies for the syndrome, partly owing to its multifactorial aetiology, highlighting the need for therapies with pleiotropic beneficial effects on muscle function. Increased understanding of the cellular, metabolic and molecular mechanisms that drive muscle wasting with ageing is informing pharmacological interventions to increase muscle strength by promoting mitochondrial function (NAD⁺-related molecules, urolithin A), restoring impaired autophagy (mTORC1 inhibitors), promoting anabolic signalling (myostatin inhibitors), acting as selective androgen receptor modulators, maintaining vascularization (VEGF, apelin), reducing inflammageing (inhibitors of cytokine signalling), and restoring innervation, anabolism and regeneration (inhibitors of the gerozyme 15-PGDH). The recent surge in clinical trials combining weight loss-inducing GLP1RA therapies with drugs that preserve muscle tissue suggests that treatments that promote both healthspan and lifespan, or 'healthy ageing', are on the horizon.

Full Text

Full text is available at the source.

View Full Text ↗

New treatments to build muscle and support healthy aging

Abstract

Full Text

You found one interesting study. We’ll send the next 7.

What Lands in Your Inbox Each Week:

Recent issues from the longevity & aging brief

Abstract

Full Text

Related papers

You found one interesting study. We’ll send the next 7.

What Lands in Your Inbox Each Week:

Recent issues from the longevity & aging brief