[Bas]

Since the rise of Biotech, the possibility of eternal life and an easy cure for cancer have been widely discussed and speculated about.

Now, however, it looks like the cancercells themselves are teaching scientists how to stop the agingprocess and bringing us closer to eternal life. Millions living now will never die!!!

http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn4947


Secret of eternal life may give cancer cure

A new system that helps cells stave off the ravages of time has been discovered by scientists. The find may help explain how some cancer cells live forever - and provide a new route of attack for up to one in 10 tumours, they say.

The system keeps cells youthful by adding thimble-like caps to the ends of chromosomes to protect them from damage and ageing, says the international team led by scientists at Cancer Research UK.

They estimate that up to 10 per cent of cancer cells may rely on this capping system to grow and divide well past their natural life expectancy.

The system is based on a molecule called RAD51D, which the team show protects DNA from damage. But the molecule also stops the protective ends of chromosomes from wearing away naturally, the process that normally allows a cell to grow old and die gracefully.

"Cancer has an amazing ability to shake off the shackles of ageing and death, which is one of the reasons why it can be so hard to treat, " says Madalena Tarsounas, who led the study at Cancer Research UK's London Research Institute

"Understanding how cancer cells remain eternally young has been a key focus of research for more than a decade, so it's particularly exciting to have made such a striking discovery," she says. "We think as many as 10 per cent of tumours may be heavily reliant on the new mechanism to keep their cells alive and these may also be highly susceptible to drugs targeted against it."

Structure and stability
The ends of chromosomes are capped by repetitive sequences of DNA called telomeres. They are important in maintaining the structure and stability of chromosomes as they divide and replicate during cell growth.

As cells grow and divide many times, these telomeres shorten until they are so short they trigger the cell ageing process, and the cell dies. But in tumours, this natural ageing mechanism is somehow blocked, and cells grow and divide uncontrollably.

Tarsounas and her colleagues used immunofluorescence to light up various molecules in cancer cells. They consistently found RD51D near the chromosomes' telomeres.

And when they used a technique called RNA interference to block the action of this molecule, the cancer cells suffered substantial damage. Most of those treated with a blocker died within seven days, but cells treated with a "placebo" were unaffected. Blocking the action of RD51D also caused the ends of different chromosomes to fuse together more often when cells divided.

Blocking this crucial molecule also increased the number of chromosomes with short telomeres, less than 6 kilobases in length, and decreased the number of long telomeres, over 20 kilobases in length.

"Cancer cells are adept at slipping the constraints of the ageing process, but this highly significant study points to ways of making them mortal, and vulnerable, once more," says Robert Souhami, Cancer Research UK's Director of Clinical and External Affairs.

Journal reference: Cell (vol 117, p 337)



[speculation] So what if, say in 50 years, a simple technology is available that would stop the aging process in humans? It would mean that millions of children living now will never die! (at least, you would still have "accidents" in which people die ofcourse but in theory there could be people around right now that could grow older than the 6000 years some biblethumbing fanatics are saying is the age of the universe. [/speculation]



Bas

[linlithgowoil]

eternal life will never happen. anyway, if it did, you'd still have an old outlook on life when you got older. i just dont hink the human brain could cope with being much over the age of 100. most people's brains give out in their 70s. you just mentally cant face living anymore, its too much of a struggle.

plus, you'd essentially have to work forever. who wants to do that? spend eternity going to work 40+ hours per week? no thanks, id rather die when my time is due.

[FoxV]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Bas', '[')speculation] So what if, say in 50 years, a simple technology is available that would stop the aging process in humans? It would mean that millions of children living now will never die! (at least, you would still have "accidents" in which people die ofcourse but in theory there could be people around right now that could grow older than the 6000 years some biblethumbing fanatics are saying is the age of the universe. [/speculation]

[Bas]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'y')ou just mentally cant face living anymore, its too much of a struggle.

[WhistleWind]

Having worked (as an IT person) on the human genome project, I
know enough genetics to know that this is not the secret of
eternal life and even if we did stop programmed cell death we would
simply extend life until we all died of cancer or some other condition
linked to dna sequence errors built up over the years due to background
radiation, carcinogens in our food or environment, our simple
copying errors in normal cell growth. Look at the current
rate of progress on gene therapy 'miracle cures' for a few simple
genetic diseases, and you will see that the programmes have killed
nearly as many people as they have cured, and that is a handful
of people. This will be like fusion research - always one generation
away from the big breakthrough.
Also, this won't stop you dying of bird flu or aids or whatever the next
pandemic is, and even if PO didn't exist, how could we justify spending
millions keeping a few people alive 'forever' when half the world already
lives below the poverty line, and as been noted above, we are in
population overshoot anyway, we cannot feed the world population we
have, let alone an exponentially increasing one.

[Specop_007]

Damnit, I knew I'd live forever.

[Bas]

Well, Whistlewind, it is natural for individual people in the field to mainly see the MASSIVE obstacles blocking the way, but unexpected breakthroughs will surely come. I'm not saying there will be any practicle uses of gentech soon, but the seeds of research are being sown SO massively around the world right now, (Far more money and people working on this science than on any other science in the history of humankind) that mindblowing applications will follow.

Bas

[Foshizzle]

Just to satisfy Bas' request, here is my first post in this forum.

Eternal life is alluring but people must also realise for which layer of the population this "breakthrough" will be available: The elite.

The men/women in power. I would be ever depressed if the current people would still be in power for 20 years (maybe not in direct power, but certainly influential). Try to imagine if Bush, Arroyo, Putin, Berlusconi, or any dictators of the past!

Then there are the more practical complications:
pensions,
insurances,
living space,
care for the elderly,
religious factions and ideologies,
fraude...
Obviously, this is just a small list of effects "Eternal life" would have.

PS Bas is a friend.

[erl]

Actually, I kind of look forward to living forever.

[Foshizzle]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('WhistleWind', '.')..and as been noted above, we are in
population overshoot anyway, we cannot feed the world population we
have, let alone an exponentially increasing one.

[Jake_old]

WTF

I would not want to live forever. Now is enough....for now

[turmoil]

i have one word (sorta): EROEI

[pea-jay]

Wait a second. If we figure out how to go on growing forever, will we humans become the cancer cells that will finally engulf the planet?

The implications of this would be mind boggling.

My head hurts...

[PenultimateManStanding]

If one could gain forward momentum as a spiritual endowment which produced the will and ability to continue growing, and if this momentum was actually rare, and just so, most people, lacking such momentum, would not want to live past 70 or 80, then such research could prove useful to the small numbers of those with a genuine reason to live to many hundreds of years.

[PenultimateManStanding]

Whenever I read or hear someone talking about the progress in longevity issue, it always seems to be discussed in materialistic terms as though it was just a matter of certain nutrients or experimental drugs, etc., that will bring the increases in years. This doesn't seem to be the right way to look at it. Call it the Ponce de Leon syndrome: looking for the magic elixir, the fountain of youth. Not that modern research is useless. But there is something immaterial involved in the longevity issue as well.

[Bas]

yeah, you'd definately need a new sort of (immaterial)attitude to life if you want to live for hundreds of years and stay content with it.

maybe:

live slow, never die, and if you do, still leave a nice corps

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('linlithgowoil', 'e')ternal life will never happen. anyway, if it did, you'd still have an old outlook on life when you got older. i just dont hink the human brain could cope with being much over the age of 100. most people's brains give out in their 70s. you just mentally cant face living anymore, its too much of a struggle.

[katkinkate]

The search for eternal youth/life is a result of the fear of what happens after death, or the fear there is nothing after death.

If the idea of our true selves being spiritual beings spending time occassionally as physical for learning experience is true, developments in the direction of eternal physical life, could really stuff up your karma.

[EdF]

A relevant story is "After Many a Summer Dies the Swan" by Aldous Huxley.

- Ed