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Scientists Discover Possible Anti-Aging Gene
werelnon writes "The BBC is running an article about researchers who seem to have discovered a gene which controls aging. By stimulating this gene, which when malfunctioning causes premature aging, scientists have managed to prolong the average life span of lab mice from 2 to 3 years. Because a very similar gene is present in humans it is quite possible it will do the same thing for people." From the article: "But there may be downsides with Klotho. The long-lived mice in the new experiments tend to be less fertile. And the gene may also predispose people to diabetes. The trick for researchers will be to find ways of getting the life-enhancing results of Klotho while avoiding the drawbacks."
Human life expectancy has been increasing overall for a long time now, and we have come to expect certain diseases and conditions including lack of fertility and diabetes along with many others (see Geriatrics).
Could the issues that these mice are having be similar to what we as humans are experiencing by exceeding the lifetimes that generations previous had?
The Hayflick Barrier, that suggests cells will replicate only a certain number of times.
Hela cells having to do with cancerous "immortal cells" and the length of telomeres and aging.
lysosomes which as the "recycling bins" of cells may overtime become "clogged" with material the cells are unable to recycle and cause cell death.
No matter that there may be a genetic tweak for aging there are other things at play that may impact on the genetic tweak.
"Academicians are more likely to share each other's toothbrush than each other's nomenclature."
Cohen
I think what the parent meant is that processed foods are known to cause diabetes. Organic foods are know to reduce the risk of cancer, so theres reasons why eating organic is good or even vital for life long health.
I also do not see how natural organic sugar is going to affect us in any way. Sugar is sugar, our bodies process the sugar from apples the same as the sugar from coke and pepsi, however apples contain many benneficial antioxidants and far less sugar than soda pop. It's just like natural sea salt, it's still just salt.
I have a degree in nutrition, and from what you are saying you seem to know know anything at all about how the human body works. High fructose corn syrup is not digested in the same way as cane sugar. The glycemic index is different, the body simply was never designed for liquid sugar. If you create liquid salt, the body is not designed for liquid salt. The body is designed to slowly digest sugars in the form of packaged foods like fruit, veggies, and from natural sources. High fructose cornsyrup was made in a lab somewhere.
Eating less fast food is healthy, but its not that simple. Not all fast food is unhealthy, and not all slowly cooked food is healthy. Most products you have in your house have high fructose cornsyrup and cancer causing agents inside them, and depending on how you cook the food decides your cancer risk.
What people need to do is just go back to the cave man diet, if its packaged don't eat it. If you can see what it is and you know what each ingredient on the back of the package is, then go ahead and eat it. Never eat processed foods and you wont have to worry so much about diabetes or heart disease. The problem is its almost impossible to find foods which arent processed in a normal supermarket.
I suggest you take a class on nutrition, and learn more about high fructose corn syrup and the dangers of certain kinds of salts, mercury, and other chemicals which are neurotoxic. Everything you eat influences your body in some way. Your health is based on what you eat, not how much, not where, not how long it takes to cook. Excercise won't cure diabetes or heart disease, it will delay it. Bill Clinton has heart disease, he jogged every day.
It would be logical, then, if evolution had produced a direct link between aging and fertility. This does not mean it has, only that such a link would be entirely reasonable. We also know, from other work in genetics, that direct links exist in countless places between all sorts of characteristics - even ones you wouldn't necessarily expect.
Sexual reproduction evolved quite late on and different species have very different numbers of X and Y chromosomes. The Duck-Billed Platypus has 5 X chromosomes, 5 Y chromosomes and a determination system that simply isn't understood at all. It would seem likely, then, that this is a product or extension of aging. Again, this would make a lot of sense, as there is really nothing else that would make sense.
I would imagine there to be multiple links, too. Genetic material is damaged over time, so a later adaptation would presumably have been to put the energy and effort into a timeframe where damage is within acceptable limits. It is also possible that, in species with simple-enough genetic material, this might even be leveraged - a small amount of damage would maximize diversity through subtle mis-copies of the genetic code. The genes would need to be fantastically fault-tolerent for this to work, but it is certainly within the realms of the imaginable.
The upshot of all this is simple enough - tweak one parameter and it WILL impact people in other ways. Rather than regarding this as a problem, it may prove very helpful, as not all parameters are going to be directly or easily controllable. There may be other ways to tweak them, if you exploit these kinds of side-effects.
Of course, they still have to find a way to alter genetic material safely. Existing mechanisms use modified retroviruses that embed desired sequences into the infected person. This method has a moderate-to-high risk of a rare form of leukemia. It is also unclear what impact (if any) the old code remaining present will have.
The problems are not well-understood and the complexity of human genetic code is still too great to be subject to detailed analysis. However, the fact that results are being obtained at all shows that these are very bright people with a good understanding of their subject. It'll be interesting to see how far this goes, over time.
One final note - this might be a way to help revive long-lived species on the edge of extinction. If increasing longevity decreases fertility for the reasons I've suggested, then decreasing longevity should increase fertility. It may be possible to use this (in conjunction with other fertility treatments, if any are usable) to help rebuild populations where the genetics would normally work against them.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)