Engineering An End to Aging

Reason writes "Biogerontologist Aubrey de Grey has put forward a biological engineering plan to end human aging and co-founded the Methuselah Mouse Prize in recent years. Now he is finally getting some of the public recognition he deserves in an excellent David Stipp article at Fortune Magazine. If you ever wondered exactly how to go about engineering away the 50 million deaths due to aging that occur each and every year - and how to bring about a sea change in the scientific establishment - then this is the place to start. As an added bonus, I don't think you'll find a more succinct (and utterly British) answer to overpopulation objections to life extension than the one at the end of this article!"

Comments

Re:for one thing

[Have Blue]

We already have an answer, it's called rotational gravity. Of course, nobody's going to put up the trillions of dollars needed to build a spaceship large enough to use it effectively.

Re:no

[DjMd]

cells that have probably lost a significant amount of their protective end-sections (IANAG--I forget what the ends of the DNA molecules are called, but they basically act as a buffer to prevent harmful mutation. Over time, though, they get shorter and disappear.)

IANAG, but I am a MD.
Those things are called telomeres, they shorten in most cells with each copying of the DNA. Except that in germ (reproductive) cells there are telomerases, which re-lenghten the telomeres.
Problem solved right, just turn on your telomerases? wrong, cancer does that....
Read more at Wikipedia

Re:no

[afidel]

Telomers. Here is a good article on the application of removing telomerase to extend the life of humans. Mice studies have shown that by capping the Telomers to keep them from unwinding that mice can be made which seemingly cease to age and which are almost immune to carcinogens. There have been mice that live several years whereas their untreated brethern die in weeks or months.

Re:no

[penguinland]

Problem solved right, just turn on your telomerases? wrong, cancer does that....

Actually, "turning on the telomerases" is closer to a possible solution than you claim. I wish I could find the article again (if anyone else can, please post), but I can't, so here's the summary: A group of scientists took a worm and messed with its genes so that it constantly made telomerase. The worm was supposed to have a life span of 2 weeks (this was not a garden worm, but some kind of funny roundworm or something). After 1 year, it still appeared normal and healthy. It is quite possible that telomerase will do this sort of thing to other organisms too, but there are ethical questions that need to be resolved before we do testing on humans.
In response to your quip about cancer, yes, cancer cells constantly produce telomerase. This is why cancer can continue to grow and not die off (indeed, you can even get certain decades-old cancer strains in biological catalogues). However, this only keeps cancer cells from growing frail and losing important genes. The part that makes them grow and divide at a malicious rate is unrelated. This has to do with a protein called p53. p53 usually just sits around, but when a cell exhibits certain cancerous behaviors, p53 lyses (kills) it. In cancer cells, the gene that makes p53 no longer works (either it has been disabled, or it has a mutation in it that causes it to no longer make p53). This is why cancer cells are harmful - they do not stop replicating. This has almost nothing to do with telomerase. The telomerase just keeps the genes in the cancer cells (and in regular cells too) healthy. Indeed, all cells have a little telomerase in them, but not enough to completely repair the telomeres after the DNA has been copied.