Old Age- Pixabay
Is it possible to live to 500 years? Studies show “aging” follows a code written in our DNA. Could the DNA be more pure in Adam and Noah’s time?
Living to the ripe old age of 500 might be a possibility if the science shown to extend worms’ lives can be applied to humans, scientists have said. U.S. researchers tweaked two genetic pathways in the tiny lab worm Caenorhabditis elegans and boosted the creature’s lifespan by a factor of five. The research raises the prospect of anti-ageing treatments based on genetic interactions, they said. ‘What we have here is a synergistic five-fold increase in lifespan,’ said lead scientist Dr Pankaj Kapahi, from the Buck Institute of Age Research, Novato, California.
‘The two mutations set off a positive feedback loop in specific tissues that amplified lifespan.
‘Basically these worms lived to the human equivalent of 400 to 500 years.’
While it could take years of research to extend humans’ lives dramatically, the study raises the prospect of anti-ageing treatments informed by genetic interactions, according to Dr Kapahi. ‘In the early years, cancer researchers focused on mutations in single genes, but then it became apparent that different mutations in a class of genes were driving the disease process,’ he said.