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posted by martyb on Tuesday October 31 2017, @09:59AM   Printer-friendly
from the getting-old-is-not-for-sissies dept.

Aging is a natural part of life, but that hasn't stopped people from embarking on efforts to stop the process. Unfortunately, perhaps, those attempts are futile, according to University of Arizona researchers who have proved that it's mathematically impossible to halt aging in multicellular organisms like humans. "Aging is mathematically inevitable - like, seriously inevitable. There's logically, theoretically, mathematically no way out," said Joanna Masel, professor of ecology and evolutionary biology and at the UA.

Masel and UA postdoctoral researcher Paul Nelson outline their findings on math and aging in a new study titled "Intercellular Competition and Inevitability of Multicellular Aging," published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Current understanding of the evolution of aging leaves open the possibility that aging could be stopped if only science could figure out a way to make selection between organisms perfect. One way to do that might be to use competition between cells to eliminate poorly functioning "sluggish" cells linked to aging, while keeping other cells intact. However, the solution isn't that simple, Masel and Nelson say.

Two things happen to the body on a cellular level as it ages, Nelson explains. One is that cells slow down and start to lose function, like when your hair cells, for example, stop making pigment. The other thing that happens is that some cells crank up their growth rate, which can cause cancer cells to form. As we get older, we all tend, at some point, to develop cancer cells in the body, even if they're not causing symptoms, the researchers say. Masel and Nelson found that even if natural selection were perfect, aging would still occur, since cancer cells tend to cheat when cells compete.

https://phys.org/news/2017-10-mathematically-impossible-aging-scientists.html

[Abstract]: Intercellular competition and the inevitability of multicellular aging

So, either you die of old age or you die of cancer. Choose wisely !!


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  • (Score: 2) by takyon on Tuesday October 31 2017, @05:38PM (4 children)

    by takyon (881) <reversethis-{gro ... s} {ta} {noykat}> on Tuesday October 31 2017, @05:38PM (#590113) Journal

    The oldest person alive is 117. That person is old enough to have interacted with a lot of cars.

    Widespread adoption of driverless cars will reduce the accident rate to a fraction of what it is today.

    Other advances will keep people alive longer on the way to the hospital.

    Meteors and space junk will be taken care of by redirection + lasers. We can break junk into multiple pieces to increase surface area, and then deorbit it. We will probably put asteroids in orbit around the Moon for mining, or tweak trajectories so that we can avoid a big hit. We just need to be able to detect smaller asteroids capable of harming a city [wikipedia.org] but not considered dire threats.

    If you get rid of the age 110-120 biological "wall", you have a lot more time to handle other threats.

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 01 2017, @01:49AM (3 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 01 2017, @01:49AM (#590324)

    We are 7-bit creatures. No one lives past 127. I celebrated getting my last bit at 64.

    • (Score: 2, Funny) by khallow on Wednesday November 01 2017, @02:00AM (2 children)

      by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday November 01 2017, @02:00AM (#590332) Journal
      Obviously the solution is to have longer years, duh. I'm not even 1 yet.
      • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday November 01 2017, @03:28AM (1 child)

        by JoeMerchant (3937) on Wednesday November 01 2017, @03:28AM (#590356)

        Depends on the goal, those biblical people lived to 900 and more - most likely due to shorter "years."

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