California scientists have created a genetically-modified living organism, capable of living 10 times longer than it is supposed to. This is the greatest extension of the life span, which until now has been reached by researchers who are studying the mechanisms of aging.

If ever one manages to apply this technique to people, one day they will be able to live up to 800 years. But is this perspective realistic?.

Valter Longo is one of a small but influential group of specialists in the field who believe that it is not only possible, but inevitable, to live for 800 years. It was his work at the University of Southern California that led to the creation of a strain of yeast that can live 10 weeks or even longer, whereas a normal fungus lives a maximum of a week.

Having eliminated two genes from the genome of the fungus and planted it on a low-calorie diet, Longo managed to extend ten-fold the life of the most common yeast cells used by bakers and brewers. The results of the research will be published this week in the journal Public Library of Science Genetics.

Of course, the difference between a yeast cell and a person is huge, but it did not stop Longo and his colleagues from saying that their studies are directly related to the problem of aging and longevity of people. "We lay the foundation for reprogramming the body for a healthy life. If we can understand how the mechanism of longevity works, it will be applied to all cells of any living organism, "says Longo.

"We are very, very far from extending the human life to 800 years," adds Longo. - I think it will not be so difficult to prolong life to 120, while maintaining health, but at some point, I believe, it will be possible to extend people's lives to 800 years. I do not believe that for any organism there is an upper limit of life expectancy ".

Most gerontologists - researchers who are engaged in the science of aging - such statements seem almost heresy. In this area, the opinion has been established that the maximum lifespan of a person does not exceed 125 years. Zhanna Kalman, the oldest man on earth with documented age, died at the age of 122 164 days. According to orthodox views on aging, she was among the few lucky ones who managed to reach this upper limit of the duration of human life.

The attitude of most gerontologists "centrists" to the idea that someday people will be able to live for several centuries - or even a thousand years, as suggested by a certain noncomformist scientist - was best expressed by Robin Holliday, a prominent British gerontologist, in his new book "Aging : The paradox of life ". "How can you make such statements?" Holliday asks.. - The first condition is to ignore the colossal body of published studies of the aging process. The second is to ignore the vast body of information obtained by studying human diseases caused by age-related changes; In other words, to ignore the mass of well-founded textbooks on human pathology. Thirdly, to assume that in the future technology based on stem cells and other techniques will allow replacing and (or) repairing the vulnerable organs of the body. Thus, a new "bionic" person will avoid aging ".

Like many other experts in the science of aging, Holliday, with deep skepticism, accepts the idea that the process of aging can be somehow outwitted, allowing people to prolong life for decades or even centuries. "All this anti-aging movement not only turns into science fiction, but it is also an astonishing arrogance," writes Halliday. According to him, a huge body of information known to biomedicine indicates that death at the age of about 125 years is inevitable.

Medicinform. Net.

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