Thursday, December 27, 2012

Anti-Aging: Are Telomeres Key?


Donna Clark asked:




Within the center or nucleus of any cell, our genetics are located on twisted, double-stranded molecules of DNA termed chromosomes. Right at the ends of the chromosomes there are lengths of DNA called telomeres, that protect a person’s genetic info, allow cells to divide, and hold a few mysterious secrets to the way we age.

Telomeres are usually likened to the plastic-type tips at the ends of shoelaces simply because they restrict chromosome ends from fraying or adhering to each other, which would mess up a body’s genetic information to bring about cancer, various other ailments or death.

However, whenever a cell divides, the telomeres become shorter. When they get too short, the cell can no longer divide and becomes inactive or dies. This process is linked with growing old, cancer including a greater risk of death. Thus telomeres have also been compared with a bomb fuse.

Will Anything Stop Telomere Shortening?

The enzyme known as telomerase does this job. Inside young cells, telomerase maintains telomeres from deteriorating excessively. Nevertheless as cells divide repeatedly, there is not ample telomerase, therefore the telomeres become shorter and the cells age.

Telomerase continues to be activated inside sperm as well as eggs, that happen to be transferred from one generation to the next. In the event that reproductive system cells did not possess telomerase to take care of the length of their telomeres, every living thing that have this sort of cells immediately would go extinct.

What About Telomeres and Aging?

Geneticist Richard Cawthon and peers at the University of Utah discovered shorter telomeres are related to shorter lives. Amongst men and women older than 60, people that have shorter telomeres were three times more probable to pass away from heart illness and eight times more liable to perish from infectious disease.
Dr. Richard Cawthon Dr. Richard Cawthon

Whilst telomere shortening may be linked to the aging process, it is not identified yet whether shorter telomeres are only a manifestation of growing older – like gray hair – or in fact promote ageing.

Researchers are not yet positive. But they have been able to use telomerase to create to keep human cells splitting far beyond their regular limit in laboratory tests, and also the cells don’t become cancerous.

If telomerase could possibly be used routinely to “immortalize” human cells, it could be theoretically possible to mass produce any human cell for transplantation, such as insulin-producing cells to cure diabetes patients, muscle cells for muscular dystrophy, cartilage cells for men and women with certain kinds of arthritis, and skin cells for individuals with significant burns and wounds. Endeavours to test new drugs and gene treatments also would be assisted by a limiteless supply of typical human cells grown inside the laboratory.

How massive a part do telomeres carry out in ageing?

A number of long-lived species like humans have got telomeres that are significantly shorter than species like mice, which live only several years. Nobody but is aware why. But it is evidence that telomeres alone don’t influence lifespan.

Cawthon’s study discovered any time people are separated into 2 groups based on telomere lengths, the half with longer telomeres lives 5yrs longer than others with shorter telomeres. That indicates life-span could be increased 5 years by growing the length of telomeres in people with shorter ones.

Folks with longer telomeres still experience telomere shortening as they age. How several years could be added to our lifespan by completely stopping telomere shortening? Cawthon believes a decade and possibly three decades.

Once a person is older than 60, their risk of death doubles with every eight years of age. So a 68-year-old has twice the risk of dying within a year in comparison having a 60-year-old. Cawthon’s study discovered that differences in telomere length accounted for only four percent of that distinction. And whilst instinct tells us older people have a higher risk of death, only yet another 6 percent is due purely to chronological age. When telomere length, chronological age and gender are combined (girls live longer than men), those elements account for 37 percent of the variation in the risk of dying over age 60. So what causes the other 63 percent?

What Are The Prospects for Human Immortality?

Mankinds’ life expectancy has grown substantially since the 1600s, when the average life expectancy was 30 years. By 1998, the average U.S. life expectancy was 76. The factors included sewers as well as other sanitation measures, antibiotics, clean water, refrigeration, vaccines and other medical efforts to prevent kids and babies from dying, enhanced diets and better health care.

Some scientists think regular life expectancy will continue to boost, despite the fact that many doubt the common age will exceed 90. But some anticipate greatly longer lifespans are possible.

Cawthon claims that if all causes of aging could possibly be removed and oxidative stress damage might be fixed, “one approximation is men and women could live 1000 years.”



Source: newantiagingsolutions.com

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