News

Can young blood slow down the aging process?

Arne Søraas
Arne Søraas

A research team led by Arne Søraas at Oslo University Hospital is competing for more than one billion NOK in an international XPRIZE contest to demonstrate that treatment with young blood plasma can slow the aging processes. The project’s primary aim is to investigate whether plasma from young donors can stabilize or reduce cognitive decline in patients with early Alzheimer’s disease. The idea may sound like science fiction, but it builds on longstanding animal experiments in which socalled parabiosis showed that blood from young animals can produce measurable improvements in the brain function of older animals.

Yanjiao Li granted 10 million in FRIPRO funds to improve IVF treatments

Yanjiao Li, Arne Klungland and Peter Fedorcsak. Photo: Guro Flor Lien
Yanjiao Li, Arne Klungland and Peter Fedorcsak. Photo: Guro Flor Lien

Yanjiao Li, researcher form the Department of Microbiology at Oslo University Hospital and CRESCO Centre for embryology and healthy development (UiO), has received 10 million Norwegian kroner in FRIPRO funding from the Research Council of Norway. FRIPRO is awarded for frontier research with the potential to push the boundaries of knowledge.
One in six people experiences infertility. Assisted reproductive technologies (ARTs)-babies now account for 6% of all newborns. Although in vitro fertilization (IVF) helps many, it still fails often. Only about half of the fertilized eggs grow into blastocysts, the stage where they are implanted in the uterus. Not every transferred embryo results in pregnancy.

Ceremony on December 3rd Oslo University Hospital has awarded 6 excellent articles for the first half-year of 2025

In order to stimulate excellent research and draw attention to the hospital's research activity, Oslo University Hospital rewards outstanding publications twice a year. Six research groups were awarded for their excellent papers published the first half-year of 2025 during a ceremony on December 3rd. Each group received NOK 50.000 earmarked for further research, and the prize winners gave short presentations of their findings.

The awards for outstanding research articles are distributed twice a year based on more than 2,400 scientific articles published annually by OUS. The division's research committees nominate the articles and an external committee evaluates and finally selects the six worthy winners.

Blog post about fertility

Yanjiao Li, Arne Klungland and Peter Fedorcsak. Photo: Guro Flor Lien
Yanjiao Li, Arne Klungland and Peter Fedorcsak. Photo: Guro Flor Lien

One in six couples worldwide struggle with infertility, and the number is rising. In Norway, the fertility rate has fallen by almost 30% in the past decade, and 6% of children are now born through assisted reproductive technology (ART).  Yanjiao Li, researcher at Oslo University Hospital and Centre for Embryology and Healthy Development (CRESCO), has written a blog post for the Oslo University Hospital blog OUS Insight. 

The “Oslo patient” – probably cured of HIV

Photo: Grete Hansen, Bioingeniøren
Photo: Grete Hansen, Bioingeniøren

Mari Kaarbø, leader of the Virology Research Group at Oslo University Hospital, was interviewed by the journal Bioingeniøren after leading one of the research teams that collaborated on the “Oslo patient” project. Kaarbø has been primarily responsible for the careful examination of the patient’s blood and gut cells to identify HIV reservoirs. The patient has been off treatment and clinically virus‑free for nearly three years.