Gregory M. Fahy Michael D. West L. Stephen Coles - The future of aging : pathways to human life extension
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Just as the health costs of aging threaten to bankrupt developed countries, this book makes the scientific case that a biological bailout could be on the way, and that human aging can be different in the future than it is today. Here 40 authors argue how our improving understanding of the biology of aging and selected technologies should enable the successful use of many different and complementary methods for ameliorating aging, and why such interventions are appropriate based on our current historical, anthropological, philosophical, ethical, evolutionary, and biological context. Challenging concepts are presented together with in-depth reviews and paradigm-breaking proposals that collectively illustrate the potential for changing aging as never before. The proposals extend from today to a future many decades from now in which the control of aging may become effectively complete. Examples include sirtuin-modulating pills, new concepts for attacking cardiovascular disease and cancer, mitochondrial rejuvenation, stem cell therapies and regeneration, tissue reconstruction, telomere maintenance, prevention of immunosenescence, extracellular rejuvenation, artificial DNA repair, and full deployment of nanotechnology. The Future of Aging will make you think about aging differently and is a challenge to all of us to open our eyes to the future therapeutic potential of biogerontology. Read more...
Abstract: The Future of Aging will make you think about aging differently and is a challenge to all of us to open our eyes to the future therapeutic potential of biogerontology. Read more...
Abstract: The Future of Aging will make you think about aging differently and is a challenge to all of us to open our eyes to the future therapeutic potential of biogerontology. Read more...
Gregory M. Fahy Michael D. West L. Stephen Coles: author's other books
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Gregory M. Fahy Michael D. West L. Stephen Coles
Mike K. S. Chan
Will Willimon
David G. Troyansky
Calogero Caruso
Theodore C. Goldsmith
Jeffrey L. Ram Ph.D. (editor)
Harry R. Moody
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Part 1
Introduction and Orientation
Introduction and Orientation
Gregory M. Fahy , Michael D. West , L. Stephen Coles and Steven B. Harris (eds.) The Future of Aging Pathways to Human Life Extension 10.1007/978-90-481-3999-6_1 Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2010
1. Bridges to Life
Ray Kurzweil 1
(1)
Kurzweil Technologies, Inc., Wellesley, MA, USA
(2)
Frontier Medical Institute, Denver, CO, USA
Ray Kurzweil (Corresponding author)
Email:
Terry Grossman
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Abstract
The future of aging and human life extension begins today, using presently available tools, but will be increasingly shaped and accelerated by ongoing breakthroughs in biotechnology, nanotechnology and artificial intelligence in the years ahead. These developing technologies should allow many to journey over what can be seen as three bridges to ever-improving life and health expectancy, such that some who survive as a result of bridge one may be able to benefit from bridge two and even from bridge three. We begin our perspective on the future of aging with a brief overview of a sampling of present approaches to life extension (bridge one) and then explain why biotechnology (bridge two) and nanotechnology plus artificial intelligence (bridge three) might allow many of us to benefit from remarkably extended lifespans in the future.
1.1 Introduction
In two recent books (Kurzweil and Grossman ), we have previously presented an optimistic exploration of medical knowledge and tools that give readers a powerful opportunity to greatly improve their health. In a snapshot in time of todays medicine and tomorrows potential, we showed that improving your health today will have long-lasting positive effects and make it more likely for you to benefit from the more powerful medical tools of the future.
Employing a bridge metaphor, what we call the first bridge of present-day therapies and guidance should enable many people to remain healthy long enough to take full advantage of the second bridge the Biotechnology Revolution, which is providing us with the means to reprogram the outdated software that underlies our biology. As we learn the genetic and protein codes of our biology, we are gaining the means of turning off disease and aging while we turn on our full human potential. This second bridge, in turn, will lead to the third bridge the Nanotechnology-AI (Artificial Intelligence) revolution. This revolution will enable us to rebuild our bodies and brains at the molecular level. In the present chapter, we briefly summarize this overview of the future of aging to provide a general context for the rest of this book.
1.2 Bridge One
Bridge one is what you can do right now to slow down aging and disease processes in order to increase your chances of remaining healthy until later bridges become manifest. We are only about 15 years from the maturation of the second bridge, and about 2025 years from the full realization of the third bridge. It is theoretically quite feasible, therefore, even for baby boomers to remain in good health until we get to the tipping point in life extension. Keep in mind that bridge one is a moving frontier: our knowledge of how to stay healthy and vital is rapidly accumulating. As our knowledge increases, bridge one will essentially morph into bridge two.
The best proven method of increasing lifespan across a broad range of animal species is caloric restriction. So, lets begin by looking at modified caloric restriction as one of the cornerstones of our bridge one therapies and then have a brief look at other suggestions for heading off aging changes. By following these simple suggestions, it is our goal to help individuals live long enough and remain in good health long enough to take full advantage of the more powerful bridge two and three technologies that will lead to more profound increases in human longevity in the decades ahead.
1.2.1 Caloric Restriction
Caloric Restriction (CR) involves eating less food while still maintaining adequate nutrition. As such, CR is different from starvation or famine. CR is scientifically the best-demonstrated intervention to safely increase longevity across a broad variety of species, including C. elegans, Drosophila, and mice, and to be tested for this effect in monkeys. Compared with controls eating ad libitum, CR animals have been shown to increase their average life expectancy as well as their maximum lifespan. More than 2,000 animal studies show dramatic results across many different species (Lane et al. ).
CR animals have more robust DNA-repairing enzymes. Random point mutations in DNA can lead to cancer and can accelerate other aging processes, so more effective DNA-repair enzymes would help explain the slower aging and lower rate of tumors in these animals (Licastro et al. ).
Of course, there is a limit to the degree to which CR can be done in an attempt to extend life. All CR animals eventually die. Because of the need to obtain adequate nutrients, it is not possible to reduce calories to one-third of normal levels and expect animals to live three times as long. It appears that, at least in the case of mammals such as rats, the optimal level of CR for longevity is about two-thirds of the calories that the animals would consume if they were eating ad libitum.
1.2.1.1 CR in Humans
A number of studies have demonstrated the potential benefit of CR for humans. For example, the people living in the Okinawa region of Japan have 40 times the number of centenarians compared with the Japanese mainland, and they experience very little serious disease before age 60 (Facchini et al..
The benefits of CR, whatever they may be, will apply only to your remaining life expectancy. If you are now 40 and have a remaining life expectancy of, say, 40 years, CR will only apply to that remaining period if you have not begun a CR program already. Therefore, in theory, the earlier you start CR, the greater the benefits. However, regardless of when you start, youll achieve the health benefits of maintaining a lower weight.
One of the biggest problems of using CR for human life extension, of course, is that it isnt pleasant. But Dr. C. Ronald Kahn, Executive Director of the Joslin Diabetes Center at Harvard Medical School, and his colleagues have created a mouse model that seems to enjoy at least some of the benefits of CR without requiring CR itself. These FIRKO (Fat-specific Insulin Receptor Knock Out) mice have been genetically modified such that they lack a single gene that controls insulins ability to allow adipocytes to store fat (Blher et al. ). Fortunately, many companies are now pursuing drugs that can block the fat insulin receptor and hopefully allow humans to gain benefits similar to those of FIRKO mice, without CR.
For now, we suggest a moderate form of CR, not as austere as the 35 percent reduction typically used in animal experiments. In Okinawa, it is customary to recite hara hachi bu (stomach 80 percent full) before eating. In other words, the Okinawans try to restrict calories about 20 percent, and this has translated into the longest life expectancy in the world.
We suggest the following guidelines:
Eat 20 percent fewer calories. A 140 pound sedentary woman should eat approximately 1,800 calories daily to maintain her weight. Hara hachi bu would mean eating 1,440 calories and would lead to a weight loss of about 25 pounds (Kurzweil and Grossman ). A 180 pound moderately active man needs 2,700 calories to remain at the same weight. Reducing this by 20 percent would correspond to 2,160 calories per day and gradually lead to a 35 pound weight loss.
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