Seeking Longer Lives; Slower Aging; Even Immortality

[ramonmercado]

NO for longevity — new evidence
By: CLIO
Published: February 21, 2013


Chemistry World reports today:

“Since 2005, a controversy has been raging about the role of nitric oxide (NO) in increasing the lifespan of various organisms. Now, US researchers may have direct evidence for NO’s apparent special powers, at least in the nematode model organism Caenorhabditis elegans.”

“the longevity debate was started by a 2005 Science paper by Enzo Nisoli and colleagues at Milan University. They reported that organisms – including yeasts and mice – on low calorie diets increased their production of NO.1 This kind of calorie restriction had already been shown to extend life above the average. Nisoli’s team’s claim was that, because NO plays such an important role in the body, its production in a calorie restricted organism may indicate that NO was involved in the lifespan extension effect in mammals.”

“Although an extremely toxic gas, even at concentrations as low as 80ppm, dissolved NO performs crucial signalling roles in the human body. It dilates blood vessels, controls hair growth and is involved in penile erection. The immune system uses NO as a signalling molecule, and, as one of the few free radicals present in our body, it also deploys it to kill bacteria. The 1998 Nobel prize in physiology or medicine was given to researchers for figuring out how this gas worked in the body.”

See http://www.rsc.org/chemistryworld/2013/ ... tric-oxide

 

[ramonmercado]

Longevitize!
By: Franco Cortese
http://hplusmagazine.com/2013/09/04/longevitize/

Containing more than 160 essays from over 40 contributors, this edited volume of essays on the science, philosophy and politics of longevity considers the project of ending aging and abolishing involuntary death-by-disease from a variety of viewpoints: scientific, technological, philosophical, pragmatic, artistic. In it you will find not only information on the ways in which science and medicine are bringing about the potential to reverse aging and defeat death within many of our own lifetimes, as well as the ways that you can increase your own longevity today in order to be there for tomorrow’s promise, but also a glimpse at the art, philosophy and politics of longevity as well – areas that will become increasingly important as we realize that advocacy, lobbying and activism can play as large a part in the hastening of progress in indefinite lifespans as science and technology can.

The collection is edited by Franco Cortese. Its contributing authors include William H. Andrews, Ph.D., Rachel Armstrong, Ph.D., Jonathan Betchtel, Yaniv Chen, Clyde DeSouza, Freija van Diujne, Ph.D., John Ellis, Ph.D., Linda Gamble, Roen Horn, the International Longevity Alliance (ILA), Zoltan Istvan, David Kekich (President & C.E.O of Maximum Life Foundation), Randal A. Koene, Ph.D., Maria Konovalenko, M.Sc. (Program Coordinator for the Science for Life Extension Foundation), Marios Kyriazis, MD, M.Sc MIBiol, CBiol (Founder of the ELPIs Foundation for Indefinite Lifespans and the medical advisor for the British Longevity Society), John R. Leonard (Director of Japan Longevity Alliance), Alex Lightman, Movement for Indefinite Life Extension (MILE), Josh Mitteldorf, Ph.D., Tom Mooney (Executive Director of the Coalition to Extend Life), Max More, Ph.D. , B.J. Murphy, Joern Pallensen, Dick Pelletier, Hank Pellissier (Founder of Brighter Brains Institute), Giulio Prisco, Marc Ransford, Jameson Rohrer, Martine Rothblatt, Ph.D., MBA, JD., Peter Rothman (editor of H+ Magazine), Giovanni Santostasi, Ph.D (Director of Immortal Life Magazine, Eric Schulke, Jason Silva , R.U. Sirius, Ilia Stambler, Ph.D (activist at the International Longevity Alliance), G. Stolyarov II (editor-in-chief of The Rational Argumentator), Winslow Strong, Jason Sussberg, Violetta Karkucinska, David Westmorland, Peter Wicks, Ph.D, and Jason Xu (director of Longevity Party China and Longevity Party Taiwan).

 

[ramonmercado]

Centenarians increase five-fold over 30 years, ONS says
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-24300051

Sheila Storer, from south Wales, turned 100 on the day her great-granddaughter was born this month

The number of centenarians in England and Wales has increased five-fold over the last 30 years, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).

Its estimates suggest there were 12,320 people aged 100 or older in 2012, with more than 600 of these aged over 105.

The newly published figures also suggest the population of over-90s - a group the ONS calls the "very old" - increased by 33% from 2002 to 2012.

Last year they numbered 465,000, almost 1% of the population, the ONS said.

Death data
The figures suggest there were 2.6 women for every man aged over 90, and 5.9 women for every man over 100.

Continue reading the main story
Centenarians in England and Wales
1982 - 2,560
1992 - 4,460
2002 - 7,090
2012 - 12,320
Source: ONS estimates

In 1981 there were an estimated 2,420 centenarians in England and Wales, and that figure increased to 7,090 in 2002.

The estimated number of over-90s was 157,390 in 1981 and 350,700 in 2002.

Estimates are produced by using "age-at-death" data. By analysing the ages and locations of people at death, the ONS estimates the number of people alive at a certain age in a certain area.

The figures are revised as more death data is received, and the most recent estimates are based on deaths in the last five years.

The ONS produces the figures for uses including research, pension and healthcare planning, parliamentary questions and media enquiries.

 

[Kondoru]

The chap next door to my father told me he will be 90 in the new year.

He says that though he is slowing down he still feels very young.

Last week he was helping his son fix the porch.

 

[Pietro_Mercurios]

A very Fortean story, caught in science's vice-like grip.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/s...could-hold-clue-to-eternal-youth-8930946.html

An end to ageing? Real-life Peter Pan could hold clue to eternal youth

The Independent. Charlie Cooper. 10 November 2013

The case of a 20-year-old woman who stopped developing when she was four has given scientists hope of isolating the gene that caused her condition and of learning more about age-related illness


Photo link: They called Brooke Greenberg the real-life Peter Pan – the little girl who never grew up.


By the age of four she had stopped growing and remained, physically and mentally, frozen as a child all her life. Two weeks ago, she died, aged 20, after becoming ill in the summer. For much of her short life, she was studied by scientists striving to understand her condition. It is known only as Syndrome X – and no one knows what causes it.

The media-friendly Peter Pan label belies a life which had more than its fair share of pain and hardship. Brooke, born in Baltimore, Maryland, in January 1993, suffered from medical problems – including hip dislocation, breathing difficulties, seizures and strokes – which began early and persisted throughout her life. But, scientists believe, if the genetic cause of her agelessness can be isolated, then Brooke Greenberg might just hold the key to one of the oldest endeavours in the history of science – slowing, or even stopping, ageing.

Brooke's DNA is now being studied, along with a handful of other children who have all the signs of Syndrome X, in the hope that understanding the condition could still yield an astonishing breakthrough in medical science.

Dr Eric Schadt, the director of the Institute for Genomics and Multiscale Biology at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York, has been entrusted by Brooke's family with their daughter's DNA and blood samples to create stem cells with which he can investigate the genetic basis of her condition. "Understanding the causes of Brooke's condition could provide insights into key development and ageing processes, which could lead to novel ways to increase longevity, and reduce age-related disorders," he said.

He has already sequenced Brooke's genome, and that of her parents and three siblings – all of whom grew up completely normally. "From this we have a number of mutations identified that are specific to Brooke that explain her condition," Dr Schadt said. "However, the function of the candidate genes we've identified are not fully known, nor how they relate to development and/or ageing."

The hope is that clear links may be drawn between the mutations identified, and Brooke's syndrome – and, more specifically, her agelessness. That mutation could then reveal the genetic processes that medical treatments would need to target to slow or stop ageing.

Another scientist who worked closely with Brooke, Dr Richard Walker of the All Children's Hospital in St Petersburg, Florida, said that such a breakthrough would have significant implications for treatments of a range of diseases associated with ageing, including cancers.

"Most intrinsic diseases are related to biological age," he said. "If you can slow that process in people with genetic markers for say, breast cancer, then we might be able to give them a little more quality life before the onset of the expression of those negative genes or else, in some way, until there could be found a cure for the disease itself."

It is likely, however, that the same unknown factor that caused Brooke's agelessness also caused her chronic ill health. Dr Schadt said that, despite this, it might be possible to encourage a less "extreme" version of Brooke's condition that slowed ageing without any of the associated problems.

"[It would be] similar to studying mutations in growth hormones that can cause one to grow uncontrollably, but then such insights lead to growth hormone treatments that can help those who have growth deficiencies grow to a more normal height," he said.

The next step, upon discovering a possible genetic basis for Brooke's condition, would be to create artificially the same genetic conditions in short-lived lab animals such as mice. "If at five years they're still young, it's a home run," Dr Walker said.

If ageing can be slowed, it may also be possible to stop it altogether. "Biological immortality is in my mind possible, but improbable," said Dr Walker. "It's not so much that we wouldn't want to do it, but think about the ethical, philosophical and religious issues that would come to the fore before we ever could get the funding. But this is an age-old question: why are we mortal? I don't think, if we were on the threshold of understanding it, that we would stop."

... (list of other human medical oddities whose conditions were instrumental in pointing scientists towards a better understanding of the human condition and facilitating medical advances)

 

[ramonmercado]

Youth-drug can 'reverse' ageing in animal studies
By James Gallagher
Health and science reporter, BBC News
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-25445748

US scientists have performed a dramatic reversal of the ageing process in animal studies.

They used a chemical to rejuvenate muscle in mice and said it was the equivalent of transforming a 60-year-old's muscle to that of a 20-year-old - but muscle strength did not improve.

Their study, in the journal Cell, identified an entirely new mechanism of ageing and then reversed it.

Other researchers said it was an "exciting finding".

Ageing is considered a one-way street, but now researchers at Harvard Medical School have shown that some aspects can be reversed.

Their research focused on a chemical called NAD. Its levels naturally drop in all cells of the body with age.

The team showed this disrupted the function of the cell's in-built powerstations, mitochondria, leading to lower energy production and ageing.

Experiments showed that boosting NAD levels, by giving mice a chemical which they naturally convert into NAD, could reverse the sands of time.

One week of youth-medication in two-year-old mice meant their muscles became akin to those of a six-month-old in terms of mitochondrial function, muscle wastage, inflammation and insulin resistance.

Dr Ana Gomes, from the department of genetics at Harvard Medical School, said: "We believe this is quite an important finding."

She argues muscle strength may return with a longer course of treatment.

A cure?
However, this could never be a cure-all for ageing. Other aspects such as shortening of telomeres or damage to DNA would not be reversed.

Dr Gomes told the BBC: "Ageing is multi-factorial, it's not just one component we can fix, so it's hard to target the whole thing.

"I believe there is a lot of cross-talk in cells and energy is very important in a cell and likely to be a very big component of ageing that might cause some of the other things that happen with ageing."

The research group wants to begin clinical trials in 2015.

Dr Gomes said human therapies were a distant prospect but: "From what we know so far we don't think you'd have to take it from 20 years until we die.

"It seems we can start when we're already old, but not too old that we're already damaged.

"If started at 40 you would probably have a much nicer window of health ageing - but I would guess that, we have to do clinical trials."

Prof Tim Spector, from Kings College London, commented: "This is an intriguing and exciting finding that some aspects of the ageing process are reversible.

"It is however a long and tough way to go from these nice mouse experiments to showing real anti-ageing effects in humans without side effects."

Dr Ali Tavassoli, from the University of Southampton argued: "It is important to note, that they did not see any changes in the mouse itself.

"This could be for one of two reasons. Either they need to treat for longer so that the changes occurring in the cells have time to affect the whole organism, or alternatively, the biochemical changes by themselves are not sufficient to reverse the physical changes associated with ageing in the mouse.

"More experiments are necessary to see which of these cases are true."

 

[Mythopoeika]

Boosting NAD levels...hmmm...

 

[Pete Younger]

No Myth, it's NAD, not nads.

 

[ramonmercado]

Bahamas: Billionaire claims he is getting younger
By News from Elsewhere...
...as found by BBC Monitoring
http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-news-from ... e-26366751

Fashion designer Peter Nygard at the Toronto Film Festival

Fashion designer Peter Nygard hopes to encourage stem cell research in the Bahamas

A billionaire fashion designer says scientists have found a way to reverse his ageing process, it seems.

Bahamas resident Peter Nygard says he is receiving stem cell therapy and that a study from the University of Miami suggests he is getting younger, the Bahamas Tribune reports. "They are looking at me, and my markers have shown exactly that I have been actually reversing my ageing and getting younger," the 70-year-old says.

He adds: "I am taking perhaps more stem cell treatment than anybody else in the world. I have been doing it for four years now, so I am sort of a testimonial that this stem cell really works."

Nygard has reportedly been advocating for stem cell research in the Bahamas. A recent change in the law would allow medical centres to open there, though the country's attorney general denies Nygard was involved in the drafting of the legislation, The Bahamas Weekly reported.

 

[PeteByrdie]

Bahamas: Billionaire claims he is getting younger
By News from Elsewhere...
...as found by BBC Monitoring
http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-news-from ... e-26366751

Fashion designer Peter Nygard at the Toronto Film Festival

Fashion designer Peter Nygard hopes to encourage stem cell research in the Bahamas

A billionaire fashion designer says scientists have found a way to reverse his ageing process, it seems.

Bahamas resident Peter Nygard says he is receiving stem cell therapy and that a study from the University of Miami suggests he is getting younger, the Bahamas Tribune reports. "They are looking at me, and my markers have shown exactly that I have been actually reversing my ageing and getting younger," the 70-year-old says.

He adds: "I am taking perhaps more stem cell treatment than anybody else in the world. I have been doing it for four years now, so I am sort of a testimonial that this stem cell really works."

Nygard has reportedly been advocating for stem cell research in the Bahamas. A recent change in the law would allow medical centres to open there, though the country's attorney general denies Nygard was involved in the drafting of the legislation, The Bahamas Weekly reported.

How much has this Peter Nygard got privately invested in stem cell research, that he feels it appropriate to make outrageous claims? Perhaps I'm just a bit cynical.:lol:

 

[Mythopoeika]

He's just convinced himself that he's getting younger, surrounding himself with young models etc.

 

[PeteByrdie]

He's just convinced himself that he's getting younger, surrounding himself with young models etc.

I don't know! The two young ladies shown in the photograph featured in the article are lovely, but I suspect they'd just make me feel older.

 

[ramonmercado]

Full text at link.

Healthy blood cells of 115-year-old woman show hundreds of mutations

In 2005, a 115-year old woman died and became the oldest person ever to donate her body to science. Now, researchers who analyzed the healthy blood cells in her body say they have identified over 400 genetic mutations, suggesting such lesions are mostly harmless in our bodies over a lifetime.

The researchers, led by Dr. Henne Holstege of VU University Medical Center in the Netherlands, publish their findings in the journal Genome Research.

They explain that genetic mutations are widely studied in the field of medicine - due to their links with diseases such as cancer - but very little is known about mutations in the bodies of healthy people.

Stem cells in our bone marrow are constantly dividing to create new blood cells, but the researchers note that the process of cell division introduces errors, and the dividing cells can acquire genetic mutations.

In patients with blood cancers, hundreds of mutations have been found; however, it has not been clear whether healthy white blood cells also contain mutations.

To investigate further, the researchers utilized whole genome sequencing of healthy white blood cells from the 115-year-old woman to determine whether mutations do, in fact, build up there.

Study points to limits of human longevityBirth of hematopoietic stem cells

The woman did not have any symptoms of hematological illnesses, the researchers say, and add that an autopsy showed she "did not suffer from vascular or dementia-related pathology."

Results showed that there were over 400 somatic mutations - those that are not passed on to offspring and do not lead to disease - in the white blood cells that were not found in her brain.
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/275859.php

 

[ramonmercado]

Scientists take steps to unlock the secrets to the fountain of youth

This image depicts telomeres on a chromosome and shows the different components required for telomerase activity as researched by professor Julian Chen of Arizona State University and published on 05/04/14 in Nature Structural and Molecular Biology. Credit: Joshua Podlevsky

ASU scientists, together with collaborators from the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Shanghai, have published today, in Nature Structural and Molecular Biology, a first of its kind atomic level look at the enzyme telomerase that may unlock the secrets to the fountain of youth.

Telomeres and the enzyme telomerase have been in the medical news a lot recently due to their connection with aging and cancer. Telomeres are found at the ends of our chromosomes and are stretches of DNA which protect our genetic data, make it possible for cells to divide, and hold some secrets as to how we age –and also how we get cancer.

An analogy can be drawn between telomeres at the end of chromosomes and the plastic tips on shoelaces: the telomeres keep chromosome ends from fraying and sticking to each other, which would destroy or scramble our genetic information.

Each time one of our cells divides its telomeres get shorter. When they get too short, the cell can no longer divide and it becomes inactive or dies. This shortening process is associated with aging, cancer and a higher risk of death. The initial telomere lengths may differ between individuals. Clearly, size matters!

"Telomerase is crucial for telomere maintenance and genome integrity," explains Julian Chen, professor of chemistry and biochemistry at ASU and one of the project's senior authors. "Mutations that disrupt telomerase function have been linked to numerous human diseases that arise from telomere shortening and genome instability."

Chen continues that, "Despite the strong medical applications, the mechanism for telomerase holoenzyme (the most important unit of the telomerase complex) assembly remains poorly understood. We are particularly excited about this research because it provides, for the first time, an atomic level description of the protein-RNA interaction in the vertebrate telomerase complex."

More information: Structural basis for protein-RNA recognition in telomerase, DOI: 10.1038/nsmb.2819

Provided by Arizona State University

"Scientists take steps to unlock the secrets to the fountain of youth." May 4th, 2014. http://phys.org/news/2014-05-scientists ... youth.html

 

[GNC]

What was that article I half-heard on the news today about injecting old folks with young folks' blood for improved health? Is that the same as the above? I don't much fancy turning vampire in my old age.

 

[ramonmercado]

What was that article I half-heard on the news today about injecting old folks with young folks' blood for improved health? Is that the same as the above? I don't much fancy turning vampire in my old age.

Youth is wasted on the young, I want their blood.

 

[Cochise]

Blood no good... Brains! Brains! We must have Brains... /zombie

Seriously, this stuff is getting ghoulish. A pill that would genuinely stop the ageing process, should such a thing be invented which I doubt, would be interesting if taken before serious decline sets in, but prolonging old age - which is all we can do at the moment - is unappealing.

Personally I'd like to avoid the care home sitting in my own filth stage entirely. If I feel its coming on I'll take up lion-wrestling or snake handling or something.

 

[ramonmercado]

Anti-Aging Pills in the News

...We are at a stage in the science where there is much promise and little certainty. How do we decide when to take a chance and what to take a chance on? All the scientific data are still only half the input; the other half is in each of us as individuals. There is a reason there is so much scatter in the statistics, and even inconsistency from one study to the next. We are all unique individuals, both in how our metabolisms respond to drugs, and in what we want out of life. We may try to choose a strategy for the long haul, but if a treatment helps us feel more energetic or more alive or better balanced in the short run, that is and should be a part of the choice that we make. I have written about my experience with low-dose deprenyl, which I take for life extension, but which also loosens my inhibitions a bit in a way that I appreciate.

A part of the calculus which is rarely discussed is our stage in life. The older we are (and the worse our health), the more inclined to take a risk on some treatment that may be our last best hope. I am 65 and can still hike all day, but I may have run my last marathon. I attend to the changes in my body from year to year, and I am willing to take some risks to slow down the loss. My friend, Stan, still works long hours at two psychiatry clinics at 86, and dances on the weekends. He is more willing than I to take a flier on a new idea. I hear rumors about 90-year-old tycoons who…but they are only rumors. ...

http://hplusmagazine.com/2015/03/02/anti-aging-pills-in-the-news/

 

[GNC]

I thought claims of anti-ageing pills were the ultimate clickbait for modern day snake oil salesmen. Used to be Viagra...

 

[GeorgeP]

Perhaps in the distant future if/when we have colonies on planets further from the sun you`ll find that you live longer. After all, life spans are determined by your closeness to a star and your exposure to its safe radiation.

I read this somewhere in a science mag whilst sat in dentists waiting room - my gums slowly going numb.

 

[Peripart]

...life spans are determined by your closeness to a star and your exposure to its safe radiation.

That's rather a sweeping statement, isn't it? I'm not one to dismiss scientific research, but given that every human ever to have lived has been pretty much the same distance from the same sun for their entire lives, I'd like to read more to establish how such a conclusion was reached.

 

[ramonmercado]

The world’s first anti-aging drug will be tested on humans next year in trials that could result in people being able to live healthily well into their 120s.

Scientists now believe it is possible to stop people growing old as quickly and consign diseases such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s to history.

Although it might seem like science fiction, researchers have already proven that the diabetes drug metformin extends the life of animals, and the Food and Drug Administration in the U.S. has now given the go-ahead for a trial to see if the same effects can be replicated in humans.

If successful, it will mean that a person in their 70s would be as biologically healthy as a 50-year-old. ...

http://news.nationalpost.com/health...t-you-live-more-than-120-years-in-good-health

 

[Mythopoeika]

Although it might seem like science fiction, researchers have already proven that the diabetes drug metformin extends the life of animals, and the Food and Drug Administration in the U.S. has now given the go-ahead for a trial to see if the same effects can be replicated in humans.

I'm on Metformin...I'll let you know how that turns out in 100 years...

 

[ramonmercado]

Life-extending hormone bolsters the body's immune function
Date:
January 12, 2016
Source:
Yale University
Summary:
A hormone that extends lifespan in mice by 40% is produced by specialized cells in the thymus gland, according to a new study. The team also found that increasing the levels of this hormone, called FGF21, protects against the loss of immune function that comes with age.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2016/01/160112093545.htm?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter

 

[Yithian]

Fast track to longevity

More on this topic:

An MIT Scientist Claims That This Pill Is the Fountain of Youth
Leonard Guarente is certain he’s succeeded where doctors (and quacks) before him have failed. His pill will either extend lives or tarnish his career.

By Benjamin Wallace

I recently received in the mail a small cardboard box, solidly constructed and colored a subtle metallic gray, from the future. ELYSIUM HEALTH was printed on it in white sans-serif capital letters. Inside, a smaller crisp white box, banded in blue and imprinted with a letterpress E, described its contents as “a daily health product designed to optimize and support your most critical metabolic systems,” including “DNA repair,” “Cellular detoxification,” “Energy production,” and “Protein function.” Within was an elegant pillbox containing 60 capsules. The technical language obscured an arresting truth: Basis, which I had ordered online without a prescription, paying $60 for a month’s supply, was either the most sophisticated fountain-of-youth scam ever to come to market or the first fountain-of-youth pill ever to work.

By the time I bought it, the brand had been pummeling my awareness for weeks, the ads barreling into my Facebook feed with claims of being the “world’s first cellular health product informed by genomics.” Under usual circumstances, a self-promoting nutraceutical with a dystopian name and the implied gift of life extension would be easily dismissible, akin to reiki or juicing. Basis, which first became available last year, bypassed the FDA’s screening process, and Elysium is effectively using its customers as human test subjects, sometimes reviewing their Fitbit and other health-tracking data to determine if the pill delivers on its promise — or causes unexpected problems.

But what promise! Basis and the other pills that will likely follow it in the next five to ten years are the fruits of a scientific backwater that has been working toward this moment for a quarter-century. These drugs and supplements are aimed to be a hack of the heretofore most intractable condition of human existence, the invisible countdown clock with which evolution has equipped our bodies. They just might postpone the onset of the most common afflictions of our dotage, from cancer to heart disease to diabetes to Alzheimer’s. We won’t necessarily enjoy longer maximum life spans (though that’s a possibility), but we very well might enjoy longer health spans, meaning the vital, productive chunk of our lives before degeneration kicks in.

Others who’d taken Basis before me had described effects including fingernail growth, hair growth, skin smoothness, crazy dreams, increased stamina, better sleep, and more energy. Once I began taking it, I did feel an almost jittery uptick in mojo for a few days, and I slept more soundly as well. Then those effects seemed to recede, and there were also mornings where I felt a little out of it. If these were placebo effects, they were weird ones, because they didn’t make me feel better, only different.

Still, the pill’s seduction was powerful. The potential benefit was profound. The cost seemed manageable. And any qualms I might have had about whether this was simply next-generation snake oil faded in the halo of the six Nobel Prize winners who sit on Elysium’s scientific advisory board. Most impressively, the company’s co-founder is Leonard Guarente, who heads MIT’s aging center and is one of the pioneers of aging science, a contender for the Nobel Prize should geroscience ever get a nod from the Swedish academy.

If I were going to trust anyone in a lab coat promising a magic pill to stay healthy longer, Guarente appeared a good bet. As the month’s end drew near, I was reluctant to stop taking Basis. It seemed foolish not to continue.

Continued in depth here:
http://nymag.com/scienceofus/2016/08/is-elysium-healths-basis-the-fountain-of-youth.html

 

[EnolaGaia]

Meanwhile, it seems another round of debate over the ultimate possible lifespan is getting underway ...

Is There a Limit to the Human Life Span?

There may be no limit to how long humans can live, or at least no limit that anyone has found yet, contrary to a suggestion some scientists made last year, five new studies suggest.

In April, Emma Morano, the oldest known human in the world at the time, passed away at the age of 117. Supercentenarians — people older than 110 — such as Morano and Jeanne Calment of France, who died at the record-setting age of 122 in 1997, have led scientists to wonder just how long humans can live. They refer to this concept as maximum life span.

In a study published in October in the journal Nature, Jan Vijg, a molecular geneticist at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York, and his colleagues concluded that humans may have reached their maximum life span. They analyzed multiple databases containing data on how long people have lived in recent decades in many countries and found that survival rates among the oldest people in most countries had not changed since about 1980. They argued that the human maximum reported age at death had apparently generally plateaued at about 115. [Extending Life: 7 Ways to Live Past 100]

However, the findings of five new studies now strongly disagree with this prior work. "I was outraged that Nature, a journal I highly respect, would publish such a travesty," said James Vaupel, a demographer at the Max Planck Odense Center on the Biodemography of Aging in Denmark. Vaupel co-founded the International Database on Longevity, one of the databases analyzed in the previous study. ...

FULL STORY: https://www.livescience.com/59645-no-limit-to-human-life-span.html

 

[Mythopoeika]

I guess it can only be debate until somebody does live to be really super-old.
Other people have suggested that it is entirely possible for ages of 1000 to be achieved. Aubrey de Grey, if I recall correctly.

 

[GNC]

But what would you look like? A brain in a jar? Life spans may be extended, but will your overall health and vigour? Even active centenarians don't look like they did in their forties, never mind their twenties.

 

[JamesWhitehead]

Yet pubes are oddly ageless.

Grant now to study this!

 

[GNC]

A brain with pubes in a jar, then.