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Aging Reversed In Mice
Hugh Pickens writes "The Guardian reports that scientists claim to be a step closer to reversing the aging process after experimental treatment developed by researchers at Harvard Medical School turned weak and feeble old mice into healthy animals by regenerating their aged bodies. 'What we saw in these animals was not a slowing down or stabilization of the aging process. We saw a dramatic reversal – and that was unexpected,' says Ronald DePinho, who led the study. The Harvard group focused on a process called telomere shortening where each time a cell divides, the telomeres are snipped shorter, until eventually they stop working and the cell dies or goes into a suspended state called 'senescence.' Researchers bred genetically manipulated mice that lacked an enzyme called telomerase that stops telomeres getting shorter causing the mice to age prematurely and suffer ailments, including a poor sense of smell, smaller brain size, infertility and damaged intestines and spleens. When the mice were given injections to reactivate the enzyme, it repaired the damaged tissues and reversed the signs of aging raising hope among scientists that it may be possible to achieve a similar feat in humans – or at least to slow down the aging process."
For the most part, most of us live long enough. What is necessary is a substantial increase in the quality of our lives, not an increase in the length of it. If this treatment can return youthful vigor to our cells, that is something amazing. So far we've been relegated to using HGH or steroids or exercise and diet to control our aging process. However, the actual cellular aging progresses unhindered.
A treatment that does not require diet and exercise modifications is sorely needed.
Honestly, i hope they do not succeed in making people live forever, there are already 6 billion of us here, and that number will only increase, and there are only so many mouths we can feed & bodies we can clothe, not to mentioning the possibility of this treatment being reserved for the super rich... Let the people die, it's why we were born in the first place.
the Dick Cheneys of the world living to 140...
in reality it would be closer to have your body begin to whither at 40 and die at 70, or have a decent body until your 70 and you can drop dead of cancer at any time after 40.
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
I don't want to age. I don't care if my life ends at 80 or 90 or 150, I want those years, every last one of them, to be spent without sitting in a hospice as a drooling vegetable. I'd rather get tired of living than spend most of my life on the sliding slope away from the heights of my youth.
When they come to take me away when I'm 150, I'll say good bye to the cruel world, the cruel bedsheets and even the cruel curtains with some sort of tassels.
And as for the population problem, if I was sure I'd live till eternity, I might not even care too much about the propagation of the species (see, I don't really see why Wowbagger had to date Trillian).
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur
There are a lot off people with the wealth, means and connections to make it happen when it's possible. So wether it should or not is not really the question it's more how the world is going to be when people will be able to live maybe 500 years or more. Sure the future is very hard to predict but just imagine people could live longer. Maybe they would actually start to learn to think not only of the short term pleasures and goals but as they have more years to live will actually take more care of the environment. Living much longer means a way better view on environmental impacts of short term actions and you have to. You have to live in your own mess a lot longer. Also the wish to have childeren now decreases with live expectancy just imagine people living 500+ years having kids only after 100 years? Perfect! Enough time to plan living space, housing, environmental issue's etc. Sure there are negative impacts aswell but when this anti aging pill comes on the market I'll take it.
I think 100+ years spent in a tin can with other people is something that has such an incredibly high chance of causing extreme psychological issues that I would not agree to send them, volunteers or not. And it raises a whole host of ethical issues as well, such as whether the travelers would have some right to kill one another if they perceived a threat or what to do with some immortal space traveling hero should he try to return to society and be utterly unable to reintegrate, similar to how a lot of ex-felons are when they are released.
Unless we're talking Starship Enterprise-style accommodations here, I would do everything in my power to stop trips like that from ever happening.
Correlation doesn't imply causation, but it does waggle its eyebrows suggestively and gesture furtively while mouthing 'look over there'. [552]