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Wow, this dopamine is good stuff … (Image: Solvin Zankl/Visuals Unlimited/SPL)

There’s life in the old boys yet. The waning libido of old male fruit flies has been restored.

Men often lose their sex drive with age – and so, it seems do . at the National Chi Nan University in Taiwan and his colleagues suspected that low levels of dopamine in the flies were to blame.

Almost 300 neurones in the fruit-fly brain use dopamine. Comparing those linked to sexual function in elderly 40-day-old male flies and sprightly 10-day-old flies, Fu found the older neurones carried 10 times less dopamine. Boosting levels lengthened the time the older flies spent trying to mate.

There are obviously big differences between a man’s brain and that of a male Drosophila, but Fu says that the new results could provide a useful starting point for in-depth studies that may have clinical implications. For instance, that research might eventually identify ways to fine-tune dopamine levels in humans, perhaps to reverse age-related declines in sexual drive, or even to suppress an overactive libido.

We already have therapies for treating male sexual dysfunction – notably the drug viagra. But probing the link between dopamine and sexual dysfunction is still important. For instance, dopamine-replacement therapy is one of the most effective treatments for Parkinson’s disease – but the .

But at the Saint Louis University School of Medicine in Missouri isn’t sure we should talk about potential implications for men just yet – it’s enough to say that the researchers “have begun to tease out an incredibly complex neural circuit”, she says.

Journal reference