Immortality

You might find this article interesting. It's about the 16 year old girl who doesn't age. I believe they are studying her DNA. She's obviously not immortal but it might give you some ideas for your story's medical explanation of immortality. Good luck.

http://abcnews.go.com/2020/Health/Story?id=7880954

There are numerous barriers to immortality (or just really long life). For instance, the Hayflick Limit, the prevalence of cancer (for instance, 80% of men over 70 have prostate cancer, but most old guys die of other things before it's diagnosed--if you plan to live forever, this is a problem), accumulated mutations causing cells to cease functioning or kill themselves off, etc. This is a good start: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Senescence

Watch the movie THE MAN FROM EARTH. it's a good movie, plus it explains why/how a guy would live forever (from a medical perspective).

One concept I saw (from a video game, so its not like its cutting-edge medicine) is that these people discovered a way to stop the degeneration of their metabolism. So, as their metabolism continued to work exactly as it had when they froze it (one guy was like 13, another 28, etc).
They also started developing crazy technology, so fighting cancer and such was easier.

HappyCamper said:

You might find this article interesting. It's about the 16 year old girl who doesn't age. I believe they are studying her DNA. She's obviously not immortal but it might give you some ideas for your story's medical explanation of immortality. Good luck.

http://abcnews.go.com/2020/Health/Story?id=7880954

Click to expand...

Fascinating.
The condition seems to be the opposite of progeria, a rare condition in which a child ages so rapidly that when they reach age seven or eight,
they appear to be age seventy or eighty.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progeria

It's been a while since I've checked my books but, IIRC:

Once a person reaches cellular maturity (around 25-30), the only reason they age is damage or faulty cellular replication. Think of a chromosome like a document tube full of spaghetti (DNA) with a tight fitting cap on each end. Over time, those caps chip, warp, break, bubble, whatever, so that they no longer function correctly. Junk DNA and improperly coded DNA ends up in the person's genetic code, so they start to age. (like a copy of a copy of a copy of a copy millions of times over)

I know there was a case study about ten years ago for a pill that literally did nothing and was prescribed for nothing (other than as a control for medical case studies), yet in conjunction with certain supplemental treatments had the odd side effect of stopping cellular degradation. I can't remember what it's called, only that one of the supplements was plain grape seed extract also used in the study.

The doctor who did the study was putting together a case study for trying to replicate the results, but I don't know if he got the funding. (Since I haven't heard anything else about it might indicate that it was just a coincidence or that he couldn't replicate the conditions of the original study.)

DNA damage is a big reason that we age. Our DNA is constantly under attack. Anything from sunlight to our own cellular respiration can cause damage to DNA. Our cells have many elegant mechanisms in place to protect our DNA, but time eventually takes its toll.

At the end of chromosomes there are telomers (part of our "Junk" DNA). These are repeating units which are believed to protect our DNA. As a person ages, these repeating units are depleted (a little bit gets lost every so often during DNA replication). Scientists believe that this contributes to aging.

So if you want to be immortal, you need to find a better way to protect your DNA or find a more stable molecule to store genetic information.

James Khoury has a book called "The Sanctuary". I'm not sure what genre you would call it.... Kind of a mystery/thriller kind of thing. Anyway... Anyone intersted in the possibility of humans being immortal or even increasing the lifespan of humans should read it. There is one chapter in specific where one character explains why its theoretically possible. Though the science of it is never explicitly discussed in any detail.
Decent book too....aside from all the randomn action thrown in every couple chapters just for the sake of keeping it from getting boring.

It's very topical considering the recent Nobel prize.

The Hayflick Limit would be the main obstacle, I'd imagine. This is what stops a cell from replicating indefinitely.

Imagine you had a train track with a built-in feature .. a replicating gadget that ran over it and photographed every point, creating a duplicate along side (complete with it's own replicating gadget!)

Now the duplicate could create a duplicate of it's own.

This is effectively how our DNA replicates.

But how many times could this be repeated? It might seem like it could go on eternally, but there is a catch - the replicating gadget can NOT run all the way to the ends of the tracks, because otherwise it would fall off. So fundamentally the two ends of the tracks would never be replicated.

There are two solutions to this:

1. Put some standard 'junk' at the end, whose sole job is to give a bit of extra track for the replicator to run on. That bit wouldn't be replicated, but you could just put a bit of random track on the end of the one you created.

This is effectively how 'telomere' works.

2. Another solution is to have your track circular .. so it has no ends. That way you could always run your replicator over every inch of track.

That would be really cool to do to a human - simply twist the two ends and make them join, so the new race of immortals would have a double-stranded helix joined into a circle, instead of our boring linear DNA.

This is effectively how some bacteria bypass the Hayflick limit.

Then you just have to stop every cell in your body from becoming cancerous.

A minor point, though, to anyone who can twist their DNA into a circle!

Mac

You might want to check out Transhumanism. It's a movement dedicated to enhancing the body in all manner of ways. Extending human life span is just one of them. They also have quite a few colourful spokespeople you could use.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transhumanism

One suggestion could be inventing a solution involving Telomerase. That would make it very topical.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telomerase

edit: Mac beat me to it.

The erosion of telomers is the thing that causes aging and ultimaetly death. Telomers can be restored with telomerase, but telomerase also causes uncoltrolled cell division.

Several years ago a reasearcher in the UK declared that he had found a way that he could keep people alive for 1000 years, not immortality but a step in that direction. I never saw the details of his method, but it did use telomerase.

As far as they know, the Great White Shark does not senesce. They can be killed, but they don't seem to die of old age.

They also said sharks don't get cancer, which isn't true. So do they say that every time a shark dies, it's killed? What happens if a shark is able to not be killed? Would it live forever?

GeorgeK said:

As far as they know, the Great White Shark does not senesce. They can be killed, but they don't seem to die of old age.

Click to expand...

This is one of those myths/misinformations that they use to sell pills filled with magic anti-aging ingredients made from shark cartilage. (Along with the oft-repeated lie 'Sharks don't get cancer')

Right now, we haven't observed Great White Sharks copulating or even giving birth ... yet if you argued that 'As far as we know, the Great White Shark doesn't give birth' it might be technically true but be so misleading it might as well be a lie.

Remember too, that in the wild almost nothing seems to die of old age. If you are made of meat then you'll get eaten before you die.

So there are zero reasons to believe that sharks don't age at a similar rate to other similar creatures. I can recommend Finch's book "Longevity, Senescence, and the Genome" for a very readable summary of aging characteristics of various animals, including sharks.

Mac

According to wiki, at least one organism has (theoretically) achieved immortality.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turritopsis_nutricula

-An

Let's say you were able to keep the biology going: beat the Hayflick limit, etc. Would you still be sane?

One of the more interesting questions would be how long a healthy human mind can continue functioning without running out of storage or indexing or the ability to access memories.

Then, there is the sheer boredom of it. Ask Mr. Flint of Star Trek, who wearied of falling in love with women who would die on him. Lazarus Long, of Time Enough for Love (RAHeinlein) alludes to this problem.

Another interesting concept is in "Buying Time" by Haldeman, wherein a method of extending life is discovered. The Institute where it is carried out sets a minimum price, and requires you to hand over all assets in exchange for a rejuvenation. The ostensible purpose is to avoid creating a class of immortals who then accumulate all money and hence, all power.

There are more, but it's late here. If you would go for immortality, there are a few problems you have to solve:

1. Overpopulation (the old aren't dying, but young keep getting born)
2. Wealth Distribution (Rich keep getting richer)
3. Welfare (immortals who become poor)
4. Boredom (physical, emotional, spiritual)
5. Insanity (Brain can't deal with one more experience)
6. Irrelevance (If the brain can't learn any more, what do we do with GreatGramps, who can't seem to be able to function in society?)

I am sure you can come up with a few more. Have fun!