Meet the Scientist Who Injected Himself With 3.5 Million-Year-Old Bacteria (vice.com)

Press2ToContinue writes with this profile of Anatoli Brouchkov, a scientist who isn't afraid to take an extremely hands-on approach to science. Vice reports: "Anatoli Brouchkov is a soft-spoken guy with silver hair, and when he lets out a reserved chuckle, his eyes light up like he was belly laughing. If you met him on the street, you'd never guess that he once injected himself with a 3.5 million-year-old strain of bacteria, just to see what would happen. According to Brouchkov, Bacillus F has a mechanism that has enabled it to survive for so long beneath the ice, and that the same mechanism could be used to extend human life, too—perhaps, one day, forever. In tests, Brouchkov says the bacteria allowed female mice to reproduce at ages far older than typical mice. Fruit flies, he told the Siberian Times, also experienced a 'positive impact' from exposure to the bacteria."

Comments

So he's a crank?

[Eunuchswear]

According to Brouchkov, Bacillus F has a mechanism that has enabled it to survive for so long beneath the ice, and that the same mechanism could be used to extend human life, too—perhaps, one day, forever.

Nutter.

Re:So he's a crank?

[Bengie]

Since something like 99.99% of bacteria is harmless to humans and this bacteria predates humans, he just wanted to see how quickly his immune system would destroy it.

Re: Russians

[MrKaos]

America is doomed.

America can only be saved by the people who love it. People who cherish freedom and the ideals of democracy and who are prepared to defend it. Your political parties are two different arms of the same political parties. You are deluded if you think left and right politics even exists anymore.

Franklin predicted that the downfall of the American dream of democracy world come from the corruption of the people. This is not to say that the people are corrupt, even when many are. What it means is that the people have been corrupted (access to education, healthcare, employment, media) so they can be incrementally cheated out of the right to democracy, with their rights progressively converted to capital.

Your most dangerous enemies are your domestic enemies who control money and power. I hope you can sort it out, I miss the nice America.

Re:Enough with the space shit

[GrumpySteen]

Found the mopey goth teen who can't get laid.

Re:Enough with the space shit

[Anonymous Coward]

I always wondered what is the purpose of spreading the disease, that the humanity is, further and further

That is what all life does. Why should we be any different?

And why do you think it needs to have a purpose? It simply is.

Re:Enough with the space shit

[Bengie]

Low population growth typically indicates an educated populace, low infant mortality, and a high cost to rear children because of a high cost of living caused by a luxury economy.

Re:Enough with the space shit

[swillden]

Low population growth typically indicates an educated populace, low infant mortality, and a high cost to rear children because of a high cost of living caused by a luxury economy.

More like population density without resource constraints.

In mice, and other animals who don't have either the means nor the motive to rationally plan their families.

Humans have rather different dynamics, and the GP's statement is correct. It's very easy to show that as infant mortality declines and wealth rises, parents choose to have fewer children and invest much more in them. This is why the first world is already at negative population growth. In some parts of northern Europe the population decline is becoming a problem, to the degree that, for example, the Danish government has been running an advertising campaign to encourage people to have children.

The population of the US would be shrinking, but immigration is keeping it growing by about 2M people per year. There are only about 1M immigrants per year, but first-generation immigrants tend to have larger families which props up the birth rate. However, the net growth rate is declining and assuming current trends remain unchanged the US will hit zero growth in about 30 years and then population will begin to decrease. The assumption that current trends continue is a pretty big one though, given the massive changes we have coming in that time frame, as automation increases dramatically. Climate change may have some effect as well.