16 replies to this topic

[VictorBjoerk]

Just a short question I haven't understood yet. What does Aubrey De Grey have to say regarding the hayflick limit? How are we supposed to overcome that????

[Luna]

He regards it by deleting telomeres completely! but the idea behind it is preventing cancer.
Delete telomeres and regenerate with stem cell therapy is his approach.

[VictorBjoerk]

Sounds extremely complicated....Where are we today regarding that? What kinds of research and experiments have been performed?

[maestro949]

He regards it by deleting telomeres completely!

Don't you mean "lengthen telomeres", i.e. WILT? Deleting telomeres would lead to apoptosis.

[VictorBjoerk]

How could this be done in real life? Wouldn't this be the hardest of the 7 steps to overcome?

[VictorBjoerk]

Which of the 7 things in SENS should be the hardest to beat btw?

[Luna]

Here is the WILT's site:
http://www.mfoundati...gename=oncosens
As far as I understand it, it is deleting the genes and supplying new cells with therapies.
Correct me if I am wrong!

Edited by Winterbreeze, 10 June 2008 - 05:10 AM.

[maestro949]

Here is the WILT's site:
http://www.mfoundati...gename=oncosens
As far as I understand it, it is deleting the genes and supplying new cells with therapies.
Correct me if I am wrong!

Originally we were both wrong. He doesn't propose neither deleting nor lengthening the telomeric region of the chromosome. He proposes deleting the genes that manage the lengthening of telomeres entirely such that the telomeres will not be extended. In this scenario, cells would continue dividing until they reach replicative senescence and ultimately die.

Wouldn't this be the hardest of the 7 steps to overcome?

Indeed. This is highly a speculative and theoretical proposal. We still don't know enough about the regulatory and upstream mechanisms involved in telomere function. IMO the best way to deal with cancer is to simply get better at finding and destroying oncocells. The earlier the better.

Edited by maestro949, 10 June 2008 - 11:58 AM.

[Unregistered]

A question and correct me if I am wrong; suppose Whole-Body Interdiction Of Lengthening Of Telomeres(WILT) comes into being and a person undergoes these changes, deletion of the genes responsible for lengthening the Telomeres and becomes lost for over 10 years or more, wouldn't they die due to needing replenishment of all our stem cell populations?

There has to be other ways than WILT, mind you I am no expert on this stuff to begin with.

[VictorBjoerk]

To someone with no advanced knowledge about WILT it looks like something very risky and could potentially kill the person undergoing it......

[VictorBjoerk]

If everything else was fixed regarding aging except the hayflick limit,how much longer would we live then?any speculations??

[Unregistered]

To someone with no advanced knowledge about WILT it looks like something very risky and could potentially kill the person undergoing it......

To be clear Shonghow, I am not saying the procedure is risky or whatever. What I am saying is if a person who has had WILT applied to them is for example lost on a desert island for over 10 years or so, they would die because they would not be getting their stem cells replaced. I would not want to be in such a position, be that vulnerable, susceptible, as a result of those genes been deleted. Therefore, I am more open to other ways of combating cancer.

Edited by Roe Williams, 20 June 2008 - 10:06 PM.

[aikikai]

WILT is in theory a good idea, but in reality - no.
WILT is created mainly to stop cancer. Personally, I believe that it is easier to find other sorts of cancer treatments before WILT get's to work (if it will ever).
I would rather see SENS develop, but also I would like to see more benefits for telomere lengthening too. I don't believe SENS is accurate in all points to stop aging. I believe aging is more a genetic factor (telomeres) and a sub-factor is damage (SENS area). With these two areas I believe we will see real anti-aging therapies. WILT won't give us it, I am afraid.

Edited by aikikai, 01 November 2008 - 12:58 PM.

[Michael]

Just a short question I haven't understood yet. What does Aubrey De Grey have to say regarding the hayflick limit? How are we supposed to overcome that????

There almost certainly is no Hayflick limit on actual cells in vivo (tho' there will be post-WILT): it's pretty widely accepted that cells in the body rarely reach senescence due to running out of telomeres. See (1,2) for a couple of reviews written for the educated layperson, and (3) for one that's more challenging. You could also [KERPLUG!] read Ending Aging: The Rejuvenation Breakthroughs That Could Reverse Human Aging in Our Lifetime for this, and almost anything else that most people want to know about SENS.

A question and correct me if I am wrong; suppose Whole-Body Interdiction Of Lengthening Of Telomeres(WILT) comes into being and a person undergoes these changes, deletion of the genes responsible for lengthening the Telomeres and becomes lost for over 10 years or more, wouldn't they die due to needing replenishment of all our stem cell populations?

Absolutely. Of course, the same is ultimately true of all the SENS interventions, albeit at different timescales: if you don't take your rejuvenation cycle, you'll age and die on a normal schedule. SENS therapies will not permanently arrest aging, but periodically reverse accumulating aging damage.

WILT is in theory a good idea, but in reality - no.
WILT is created mainly to stop cancer. Personally, I believe that it is easier to find other sorts of cancer treatments before WILT get's to work (if it will ever).

I'm absolutely sure that you're right -- heck, we're coming out with new treatments every year, and they're helping people live longer, healthier lives -- for now. But once the rest of the SENS panel is implemented, cancer therapies dependent on mechanisms other than complete ablation of telomere-maintenance machinery will buy us little (and progressively less) time, because of cancer's inherent evolutionary ingenuity (see, again, our book to have this laid out in detail). We don't notice this much at present because our lives are cut miserably short by other things before many of these seemingly-defeated cancers get a chance to resurge, or heretofore-occult and/or slow-growing cancers become a clinical threat; once we're otherwise-rejuvenated, and living decades longer, we'll be facing down an exponential cancer nightmare unless we have an absolute abrogation of the process.
-Michael

References

1. Hopkin K.
More than a sum of our cells.
Sci Aging Knowledge Environ. 2001 Oct 3;2001(1) : oa4. Review.
PMID: 14602948 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

2. Hornsby PJ.
Mouse and human cells versus oxygen.
Sci Aging Knowledge Environ. 2003 Jul 30;2003(30):PE21.
PMID: 12890857 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

3. Patil CK, Mian IS, Campisi J.
The thorny path linking cellular senescence to organismal aging.
Mech Ageing Dev. 2005 Oct;126(10):1040-5.
PMID: 16153470 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

Edited by Michael, 01 November 2008 - 04:11 PM.

[pyre]

I'm absolutely sure that you're right -- heck, we're coming out with new treatments every year, and they're helping people live longer, healthier lives -- for now. But once the rest of the SENS panel is implemented, cancer therapies dependent on mechanisms other than complete ablation of telomere-maintenance machinery will buy us little (and progressively less) time, because of cancer's inherent evolutionary ingenuity (see, again, our book to have this laid out in detail). We don't notice this much at present because our lives are cut miserably short by other things before many of these seemingly-defeated cancers get a chance to resurge, or heretofore-occult and/or slow-growing cancers become a clinical threat; once we're otherwise-rejuvenated, and living decades longer, we'll be facing down an exponential cancer nightmare unless we have an absolute abrogation of the process.
-Michael

Ditto on that. It is also worth noting for those that feel as though telomere-induced senescence results in aging that humans have incredibly short telomeres in comparison to mice, yet live significantly shorter lives. There are certainly other genetic factors that influence aging, but as a biologist who has been looking at aging for many years, I've thrown my lot in with the SENS camp.

Further, there will always be a nonzero rate of cancer evasion of any anti-cancer treatment simply based on the evolutionary potential of cancer, as Michael mentioned. There are certainly many good and well-researched ways to treat cancer, but the only mechanism of curing and preventing cancer will be removal of evolution-enabling machinery.

[Heliotrope]

i'm sure they'll figure out a way to overcome the limit. I asked a similar ques several months back. good discussion material. Too bad Lenard Hayflick is not on our side, he seems pessimistic about LE

btw, how did you change your name Victor? you used to be shonghow right? unless you posted a 1,000+ posts under this one too haha

[Luna]

Actually several months ago hayflick seemed to say something that suggests he is on our side!