WEBVTT - Never Grow Old 0:00:00.160 --> 0:00:07.160 Brought to you by Toyota. Let's go places. Welcome to 0:00:07.360 --> 0:00:15.200 Forward Thinking. Hey there, welcome to the Forward Thinking, the 0:00:15.320 --> 0:00:18.200 podcast that looks at the future. It says, you're older 0:00:18.200 --> 0:00:21.239 than you've ever been, and now you're even older. I'm 0:00:21.320 --> 0:00:25.760 Jonathan Strick and I'm Joe McCormick. And so today you 0:00:25.800 --> 0:00:28.640 can probably guess that we're gonna be talking about aging, 0:00:28.760 --> 0:00:31.840 and specifically, since you probably know what kind of show 0:00:32.000 --> 0:00:36.440 this is, technological and scientific responses to aging. What do 0:00:36.479 --> 0:00:40.199 we do with the issue of aging as a as 0:00:40.200 --> 0:00:42.760 a techno scientific culture. Do we do we just let 0:00:42.800 --> 0:00:46.200 it happen and study how it happens? Heck, no, Joe, 0:00:46.240 --> 0:00:49.880 we do. We try to do something about it. We 0:00:49.880 --> 0:00:53.880 we we grab onto the sand and we make tracks 0:00:53.960 --> 0:00:57.800 with our fingers as the cold approach of time drags 0:00:57.920 --> 0:01:01.400 us ever onward toward oblivion. That's what we do. So, 0:01:01.800 --> 0:01:06.080 like a cat towards a cat carrying, let's mix some metaphors. 0:01:06.120 --> 0:01:08.600 I like it. So this isn't the first time we've 0:01:08.600 --> 0:01:11.720 talked about this. Back in June, we did a couple 0:01:11.760 --> 0:01:16.280 of episodes on various forms of technological immortality, though I 0:01:16.319 --> 0:01:19.280 think we were covering some other issues they're like, you know, 0:01:19.319 --> 0:01:21.520 would you want to have your consciousness put into a 0:01:21.520 --> 0:01:24.840 computer and stuff like that. Uh. And so one of 0:01:24.840 --> 0:01:27.840 the episodes was called who Wants to Live Forever? And 0:01:27.920 --> 0:01:30.399 the other one was more focused on something along the 0:01:30.440 --> 0:01:32.360 lines of what we're gonna be talking about today, which 0:01:32.480 --> 0:01:35.240 was the theories of the gerontologist Aubrey de Gray, and 0:01:35.280 --> 0:01:40.840 that podcast, quite stupidly, was called Shades of Degray. I 0:01:40.880 --> 0:01:43.920 think that was my choice here. I think that was 0:01:43.959 --> 0:01:47.200 my call. Well, we we're gonna be talking a lot 0:01:47.240 --> 0:01:51.440 about decay today. We talked about Degray in that episode, 0:01:51.440 --> 0:01:53.760 obviously quite extensively, and some of the stuff we're going 0:01:53.760 --> 0:01:55.680 to cover is probably going to be a little bit 0:01:56.080 --> 0:01:59.160 of a repetition of you know, it has been a minute, 0:01:59.160 --> 0:02:01.200 so we thought that we would revisit the topic. Also, 0:02:01.240 --> 0:02:02.680 I think that I think it's safe to say that 0:02:02.720 --> 0:02:06.480 all of us know how to speak better now. I 0:02:06.560 --> 0:02:08.680 was about to say talk better, and I caught myself 0:02:10.120 --> 0:02:14.000 more more good now ish. Uh So, Okay, So so 0:02:14.040 --> 0:02:17.120 today we're going to talk about the research being done, 0:02:17.480 --> 0:02:19.880 and then in the second part we're going to talk 0:02:19.880 --> 0:02:24.160 about the reasons why there's this ridiculously heated debate, or 0:02:24.200 --> 0:02:26.720 maybe not ridiculously like like, maybe it's a very human 0:02:27.000 --> 0:02:30.280 debate to be having about anti aging research and treatments 0:02:30.320 --> 0:02:32.680 and the whole perspective on the thing, because you hear 0:02:32.760 --> 0:02:34.680 so many different things from so many different groups, and 0:02:34.960 --> 0:02:36.840 who can you trust. We'll get to that in the 0:02:36.880 --> 0:02:42.240 next episode. For now, scientifically speaking, what is aging? It's 0:02:42.280 --> 0:02:44.360 kind of a good question. It's one of those things 0:02:45.280 --> 0:02:48.400 where you know it when you see it, but can 0:02:48.480 --> 0:02:55.480 you describe exactly what it is? Yeah, So here's the problem, right, Um, 0:02:55.520 --> 0:02:59.919 there is no full understanding in the realm of science 0:03:01.120 --> 0:03:06.320 of everything that goes into aging. We understand elements of aging, 0:03:06.760 --> 0:03:09.480 We understand some of the cause and effect of certain 0:03:09.600 --> 0:03:12.840 aspects of aging, but when you look at aging as 0:03:13.200 --> 0:03:18.000 an overall condition, we don't have a full understanding of 0:03:18.120 --> 0:03:20.880 what that is. Yeah. And one of the other things 0:03:20.880 --> 0:03:23.720 I would say is that you might have trouble with 0:03:23.760 --> 0:03:29.320 such a macroscopic effect as aging um in distinguishing causes 0:03:29.400 --> 0:03:32.120 from effects. For example, one thing we know is not 0:03:32.240 --> 0:03:35.680 a cause of aging, but you could say, since it correlates, 0:03:35.760 --> 0:03:39.280 is that aging is caused by hair turning gray. If 0:03:39.280 --> 0:03:41.920 you didn't understand that, it went the other way around. 0:03:42.000 --> 0:03:44.240 You could get confused on this point, and there are 0:03:44.320 --> 0:03:47.280 some issues where it's not quite so clear. And there 0:03:47.280 --> 0:03:50.960 are also some conditions and diseases that could end up 0:03:51.280 --> 0:03:55.520 exacerbating the effects of aging or perhaps replicating the effects 0:03:55.520 --> 0:04:00.520 of aging without itself being aging. So you know that 0:04:00.520 --> 0:04:04.720 that also throws in more confusion into the mix. Yeah, 0:04:04.720 --> 0:04:07.560 but one of the biggest concepts in aging is something 0:04:07.600 --> 0:04:09.920 that figures into what we talked about in that episode 0:04:09.920 --> 0:04:13.960 about Aubrey De Gray. Aubrey De Gray's program UH is 0:04:14.440 --> 0:04:21.080 a program for engineering negligible sinescence. What is sescence. Sinescence 0:04:21.160 --> 0:04:24.160 is the idea, and generally this this refers to growing 0:04:24.200 --> 0:04:27.960 old and deteriorating in power with age, but at the 0:04:28.040 --> 0:04:32.640 cellular level, senescence has a more specific definition. So your 0:04:32.680 --> 0:04:36.000 body tissues remain healthy and strong over the years by 0:04:36.040 --> 0:04:40.400 replenishing themselves through cell division. Cells divide and make new, 0:04:40.800 --> 0:04:43.799 brand new, happy, healthy cells out of the old cells. 0:04:44.080 --> 0:04:47.960 And that's great. It keeps your tissues refreshed. But when 0:04:48.000 --> 0:04:53.040 body cells cease their self replication, they stop making brand new, 0:04:53.160 --> 0:04:57.520 spanking new, happy, fresh little cells. This is known as senescence. 0:04:57.560 --> 0:05:01.160 It's also known as cells sort of going into retire ironment. Yeah, 0:05:01.240 --> 0:05:04.840 and that process leads into cell death. But why on 0:05:04.880 --> 0:05:07.719 earth would our bodies be coded to kill off cells. 0:05:07.800 --> 0:05:09.479 That seems like the opposite of what a body would 0:05:09.520 --> 0:05:12.960 want to do. Yeah. Uh, it is helpful in some situations, 0:05:13.200 --> 0:05:15.800 you know, when cells are too damage to continue functioning correctly, 0:05:16.240 --> 0:05:19.160 and so that that's the body's way of telling them 0:05:19.160 --> 0:05:21.599 to just just go out and quit. You've done enough, 0:05:21.880 --> 0:05:24.720 You're fine. Um or in the case of sing like cancer, 0:05:25.040 --> 0:05:27.960 it's really good to be able to just just be like, 0:05:28.000 --> 0:05:30.000 you know what, we don't really need you any here 0:05:30.240 --> 0:05:33.680 here anymore. We're doing okay. And certainly, if you didn't 0:05:33.839 --> 0:05:38.920 have senescence, if you didn't have this process, uh, if 0:05:38.920 --> 0:05:43.080 there was this unchecked method of cellular division, it could 0:05:43.240 --> 0:05:47.880 lead to things like cancer. However, if you have senescence 0:05:47.920 --> 0:05:50.800 body wide, then you're essentially saying that the cells have 0:05:50.880 --> 0:05:57.279 stopped dividing and now it's borrowed time because cells have lifespans. Yeah. 0:05:57.400 --> 0:05:59.360 And you know, if you think about it from the 0:05:59.480 --> 0:06:02.719 genetic perspective of your cells, you can see why this 0:06:02.839 --> 0:06:06.080 might be the case, because what is the purpose of 0:06:06.120 --> 0:06:09.640 your body Genetically speaking, It's not to be happy and 0:06:09.720 --> 0:06:14.480 healthy forever. It's to survive long enough to achieve prodigious 0:06:14.480 --> 0:06:20.320 sexual recombination. And uh and so, I mean, once you're 0:06:20.400 --> 0:06:24.400 beyond the age of sexual reproduction, what of what uses 0:06:24.440 --> 0:06:27.640 it to your genes to just keep making your muscles strong? Yeah, 0:06:27.680 --> 0:06:30.000 we're really just biting our thumbs at our genes every 0:06:30.080 --> 0:06:33.360 day that we live without having healthy children. Yeah, yeah, 0:06:34.120 --> 0:06:39.480 I'm alright with that. Okay, so so, so, why why 0:06:39.480 --> 0:06:42.680 does senescence happen? Researchers think that on a cellular level, 0:06:42.720 --> 0:06:47.960 it happens because of this stuff called telomeres. Telomeres our 0:06:48.080 --> 0:06:50.880 our DNA caps on the end of your chromosomes that 0:06:50.920 --> 0:06:53.760 protect your DNA from wear and tear when cells divide. 0:06:54.080 --> 0:06:57.320 Geneticist Elizabeth Blackburn famously compare them to the little plastic 0:06:57.360 --> 0:06:59.920 caps on the end of shoelaces. Oh, I've heard Michia 0:07:00.080 --> 0:07:01.919 Cake you say the same thing. But I bet he 0:07:01.960 --> 0:07:04.440 got it from her. I I think I think she 0:07:04.560 --> 0:07:06.800 was the originator of that phrase. Now I'm terrified that 0:07:06.800 --> 0:07:09.200 I'm wrong. No, I bet, I bet, I bet that's 0:07:09.240 --> 0:07:12.120 the case. Okay, Uh, so, so you're you're you're telomeres 0:07:13.040 --> 0:07:15.880 unlike well, well, actually exactly like the plastic caps on 0:07:15.880 --> 0:07:17.920 the end of your shoeleases are also subject to the 0:07:17.960 --> 0:07:20.440 same wear and tear that happens to the DNA when 0:07:20.440 --> 0:07:23.920 your cells are dividing, so they get shorter after many 0:07:23.960 --> 0:07:27.360 cell divisions, and when they wear down enough, the cells 0:07:27.400 --> 0:07:30.760 that they're in stop dividing, and that is in essence, 0:07:31.840 --> 0:07:35.600 So when that happens to adult stem cells, that might 0:07:35.640 --> 0:07:38.280 be one of the critical factors of aging, because adult 0:07:38.320 --> 0:07:40.480 stem cells are the things that create new cells when 0:07:40.480 --> 0:07:44.120 you're when your tissues are damaged or or your your 0:07:44.160 --> 0:07:47.040 blood needs to be replaced, and they're usually just hanging 0:07:47.080 --> 0:07:49.360 out in a state of quiescence, a sort of like 0:07:49.360 --> 0:07:54.080 like yellow alert. Okay, so they're not actively creating new cells, 0:07:54.400 --> 0:07:57.840 and they don't themselves divide to create new stem cells 0:07:58.000 --> 0:08:01.400 unless some kind of damage happens. And there have been 0:08:01.440 --> 0:08:03.440 some studies that have shown that with age, or or 0:08:03.480 --> 0:08:08.040 possibly once having gone enough cell divisions, adult stem cells 0:08:08.080 --> 0:08:12.000 don't function as quickly or as completely as they used to, 0:08:12.120 --> 0:08:14.760 so your body is less able to replace and repair 0:08:15.240 --> 0:08:17.440 damage that gets done. And of course, when one thing 0:08:17.440 --> 0:08:20.200 gets damaged in one of our bodily systems, it reduces 0:08:20.240 --> 0:08:22.360 the function of other things, or you know, like weakens 0:08:22.520 --> 0:08:28.080 the structures needed to prevent further damage, like in osteoporosis. Right, Okay, 0:08:28.120 --> 0:08:31.320 that makes sense. However, there is a process of your 0:08:31.320 --> 0:08:40.520 cells that protects your telomeres, an enzyme called telomerase to telomerasemerase, telomerase, interesting, 0:08:40.559 --> 0:08:48.000 telomerase like telemachus. I like that you look at obviously, 0:08:48.800 --> 0:08:53.200 and I'm like, I want to cobb Well anyway, not kebabs. 0:08:53.200 --> 0:08:58.120 But telomerase or telomerase controls the generation and the formation 0:08:58.240 --> 0:09:01.440 and the length of your telomere, but not all of 0:09:01.480 --> 0:09:04.320 your cells make it, which is actually a good thing 0:09:04.600 --> 0:09:08.040 because cancer. But more more on that later on. Didn't 0:09:08.040 --> 0:09:10.360 that funny that cancer link just keeps coming up in 0:09:10.400 --> 0:09:13.520 this episode? Well, it's gonna come up a lot in general, 0:09:13.520 --> 0:09:15.560 not just in this episode, but in the following one. 0:09:15.679 --> 0:09:18.959 Because one of the things when you're talking about trying 0:09:18.960 --> 0:09:22.920 to find a way to counteract or even reverse aging, 0:09:23.880 --> 0:09:26.240 one of the big questions that comes up in everyone's 0:09:26.240 --> 0:09:31.520 mind is you're talking about regenerating tissue that is frighteningly 0:09:31.720 --> 0:09:36.360 close to the concept of uncontrolled cellular division, which is 0:09:36.360 --> 0:09:41.319 what cancer is made of. Exactly. Yeah, undifferentiated, uncontrolled growth. 0:09:42.440 --> 0:09:45.439 So yeah, so that that's an interesting avenue of research 0:09:45.480 --> 0:09:48.000 about what causes aging. But we've also got the issue 0:09:48.040 --> 0:09:51.720 of mitochondria, right, oh yeah, okay, so so our selves 0:09:52.040 --> 0:09:56.040 mitochondria definitely become less efficient as we age. UM and 0:09:56.040 --> 0:09:59.440 and my mitochondria if you guys don't remember, from like 0:09:59.559 --> 0:10:04.040 seventh grade biology or possibly from a wind in the door? 0:10:04.640 --> 0:10:08.640 Was that which which one did you guys ever met? Yeah? Yeah, yeah, 0:10:08.679 --> 0:10:11.400 she totally talked about mitochondria and one of those books 0:10:11.480 --> 0:10:14.839 at any rate. Um. But what mitochondria actually are are 0:10:14.920 --> 0:10:18.920 the organelles inside of ourselves that, among other things, chemically 0:10:18.960 --> 0:10:23.000 convert the nutrients that we take in into the molecules 0:10:23.040 --> 0:10:26.240 that our cells eat to gain the energy they need 0:10:26.280 --> 0:10:28.160 to do what they do. Yeah. I think the common 0:10:28.160 --> 0:10:30.640 way of expressing it is that they're the power plants 0:10:30.679 --> 0:10:33.720 of our selves exactly. Yeah. Yeah. They produce what is it, 0:10:33.920 --> 0:10:40.760 t um and so when mitochondria become less efficient, they 0:10:40.800 --> 0:10:44.160 produce less a tp Our cells can't do as much, 0:10:44.559 --> 0:10:50.160 and therefore our body's entire metabolic activity systems slows down. 0:10:50.280 --> 0:10:53.240 We have, you know, less nutrient transfer, fewer new cells, 0:10:53.640 --> 0:10:57.040 decreased immune response all that good stuff that goes into 0:10:57.120 --> 0:11:00.800 a young and healthy body. But of course all that, 0:11:00.880 --> 0:11:04.560 all that that and more tends to add up to 0:11:04.640 --> 0:11:08.080 these macroscopic effects that we see on the body as 0:11:08.080 --> 0:11:10.640 a whole. Oh sure, yeah, and we see plenty of those. 0:11:10.840 --> 0:11:14.120 Yeah right. So, for example, some of these macroscopic effects 0:11:14.160 --> 0:11:17.720 that we'll see, one of the most general ones tends 0:11:17.720 --> 0:11:21.040 to be a decrease in tissue elasticity. And this is 0:11:21.160 --> 0:11:23.440 this is pretty much body wide, but really we're talking 0:11:23.480 --> 0:11:26.400 about muscles and blood vessels in particular. Yeah. Yeah, it's 0:11:26.440 --> 0:11:30.560 the the collagen inside the little tiny molecules of proteins 0:11:30.559 --> 0:11:34.000 that are folded up. Stop being as cool. Yeah, it's 0:11:34.040 --> 0:11:37.360 it's like if you you know, you got that that 0:11:37.480 --> 0:11:39.760 one pair of underwear you really should be tossing out. 0:11:39.960 --> 0:11:43.280 It just in't doing the job anymore. It's that elastic 0:11:43.400 --> 0:11:46.160 is all totally worn out. It's kind of sad when 0:11:46.200 --> 0:11:49.360 that that pair of underwear is actually representing something like, 0:11:49.400 --> 0:11:54.040 I don't know, your heart. That's a bad thing. Yeah, 0:11:54.200 --> 0:11:56.320 but if only science could replace it with a pair 0:11:56.320 --> 0:12:01.560 of means right. Bones also also come weaker. You lose 0:12:01.640 --> 0:12:05.040 bone mass faster than you are regenerating it, uh, and 0:12:05.200 --> 0:12:08.520 that can lead to osteoporosis, which is the more extreme 0:12:08.640 --> 0:12:11.880 version of that problem. You know, one thing I've heard 0:12:11.960 --> 0:12:16.239 expressed by some of the advocates of aging reversal technology 0:12:16.559 --> 0:12:20.120 is to think about it this way. Aging is the 0:12:20.240 --> 0:12:25.800 number one risk factor for almost every disease we know of. 0:12:26.440 --> 0:12:30.240 I'm not quite everyone, but the vast majority of them. 0:12:30.440 --> 0:12:32.120 And if you think about it like that, it kind 0:12:32.120 --> 0:12:35.760 of might tweak your understanding of whether or not we 0:12:35.800 --> 0:12:39.160 should do something about aging. Because if you had, say, 0:12:39.200 --> 0:12:42.560 if you said cigarette smoking was the number one risk 0:12:42.679 --> 0:12:47.360 factor for the majority of known diseases and conditions, I mean, 0:12:47.440 --> 0:12:49.599 it seems like you'd really want to do something to 0:12:49.640 --> 0:12:52.040 get people to stop smoking. It's it's like, well, obviously, 0:12:52.120 --> 0:12:55.319 don't smoke. That's terrific. So clearly you should stop aging. 0:12:55.440 --> 0:12:59.920 Just don't do it. Don't age, kids, don't age. My 0:13:00.080 --> 0:13:02.560 life's been doing that for years. She celebrates her twenty 0:13:02.640 --> 0:13:06.960 nine birthday every year. Oh that old joke, And you 0:13:07.040 --> 0:13:12.880 make that joke every year, don't you might? Okay, So, 0:13:12.880 --> 0:13:14.679 so one idea to keep in mind going forward, we 0:13:14.720 --> 0:13:17.120 are going to talk about some some new ideas and 0:13:17.160 --> 0:13:20.000 what to do about aging and in ways to counteract it. 0:13:20.040 --> 0:13:22.679 But one idea to keep in mind is also the 0:13:22.720 --> 0:13:28.200 difference between the concepts of life span and health span um. 0:13:28.320 --> 0:13:30.600 And so this is something that I think is recently 0:13:31.720 --> 0:13:34.439 something that doctors have started to talk about more. Lifespan, 0:13:34.480 --> 0:13:37.199 of course, is just time from birth until death. How 0:13:37.200 --> 0:13:42.080 many years do you Yeah, But health span is time 0:13:42.160 --> 0:13:46.120 until serious illness. And a lot of medical technology over 0:13:46.200 --> 0:13:50.120 the you know, past decades, has succeeded in extending the 0:13:50.200 --> 0:13:54.280 former without necessarily extending the ladder. So, in other words, 0:13:54.480 --> 0:13:59.800 life expectancy has increased, but but how long you remain 0:14:00.040 --> 0:14:03.840 healthy within that lifespan hasn't measurably increased at the same rate, 0:14:04.520 --> 0:14:06.360 or I should say, just increased at the same rate. 0:14:06.440 --> 0:14:09.240 It has certainly increased, there's no denying that, but it 0:14:09.280 --> 0:14:12.720 has an increased to the point where you would say, um, 0:14:12.760 --> 0:14:15.480 if the average life expectancy has gone up three years, 0:14:15.880 --> 0:14:19.240 the health span has not done that. Yeah, And so 0:14:19.360 --> 0:14:21.240 that's a thing that's important to keep in mind when 0:14:21.280 --> 0:14:25.320 you're talking about rejuvenation research. A lot of it is 0:14:25.360 --> 0:14:30.240 focused on extending quality of life and not just extending life, 0:14:30.320 --> 0:14:34.280 So maybe not even extending lifespan at all. Maybe that 0:14:34.360 --> 0:14:37.680 you know that that could happen, But perhaps the focus 0:14:37.720 --> 0:14:40.520 for at least some of the researchers is not let's 0:14:40.520 --> 0:14:41.920 see if we can get people to live to a 0:14:42.000 --> 0:14:45.040 hundred and twenty on a regular basis. It's let's see 0:14:45.080 --> 0:14:48.360 if we can make sure people maintain a good quality 0:14:48.360 --> 0:14:52.920 of life, a good healthy life, or more of their lifespan. 0:14:53.160 --> 0:14:54.840 I mean, think about it this way. Would you rather 0:14:54.960 --> 0:14:57.800 live to two hundred but for the second two hundred 0:14:57.920 --> 0:15:01.240 years you can't get out of bed? Or would you 0:15:01.360 --> 0:15:04.120 rather live to e ight but be healthy and fit 0:15:04.240 --> 0:15:11.720 the whole time can't or whoa, there's a lot of 0:15:11.760 --> 0:15:15.080 comic books in the universe, Like I could spend a 0:15:15.160 --> 0:15:18.680 solid decade or two just reading comics, and that's not 0:15:18.760 --> 0:15:21.920 even getting into nonfiction. But eventually you'd want to get 0:15:21.920 --> 0:15:23.840 out of bed, go line up to see the movie 0:15:23.920 --> 0:15:28.800 that's going to disappoint you. That's what digital downloads are for, 0:15:28.840 --> 0:15:31.800 all right. So let's talk about some of the research. Yeah, well, okay, 0:15:31.840 --> 0:15:36.200 So there are some avenues of research into rejuvenation or 0:15:36.320 --> 0:15:39.400 aging reversal that we have talked about in recent podcasts. 0:15:39.680 --> 0:15:41.880 One of them, for example, is if you remember our 0:15:41.920 --> 0:15:45.000 episode about the Future of blood, we talked about research 0:15:45.080 --> 0:15:49.320 into the rejuvenating effects of young blood. Now really, honestly 0:15:49.400 --> 0:15:54.000 that research has goes back centuries. Elizabeth. You have to 0:15:54.040 --> 0:15:59.120 believe the the sensational reports of Elizabeth Bathory. Yes, but no, 0:15:59.280 --> 0:16:03.000 that this is very interesting though it's yet another one 0:16:03.000 --> 0:16:06.720 of these things where we should always couch all coverage 0:16:06.920 --> 0:16:10.600 of aging reversal research with it. Let's not get carried 0:16:10.640 --> 0:16:13.560 away here, um that you know, there is there is 0:16:13.600 --> 0:16:16.080 some interesting research coming out and we want to keep 0:16:16.080 --> 0:16:18.400 an eye on it. But nobody's found the fountain of 0:16:18.440 --> 0:16:22.360 youth yet. But yeah, yeah, can we just never use 0:16:22.440 --> 0:16:25.320 that phrase again as a as a human species. I'm 0:16:25.440 --> 0:16:28.040 right there with you, Lauren. Okay, so, but but a 0:16:28.120 --> 0:16:29.960 quick refresher on the blood thing if you if you 0:16:30.000 --> 0:16:33.400 wanna full breakdown of this, you can go back and 0:16:33.480 --> 0:16:35.560 check out our episode on the Future of blood. But 0:16:35.960 --> 0:16:38.720 in short, multiple lines of research have shown that giving 0:16:38.800 --> 0:16:43.080 older animals infusions of blood from younger animals of the 0:16:43.120 --> 0:16:47.440 same species has rejuvenating effects on body tissues. And some 0:16:47.480 --> 0:16:50.920 of the experiments have been in what's called heterochronic parabiases, 0:16:51.040 --> 0:16:55.200 where you sew together to mice one young and one old, 0:16:55.640 --> 0:16:58.560 so that they share a circulatory system and a common 0:16:58.600 --> 0:17:02.880 pool of blood. That, yeah, that does sound creepy, but 0:17:03.000 --> 0:17:05.480 the results, it's an extreme measure, like I'm not going 0:17:05.520 --> 0:17:07.960 to sign up for that tomorrow, but the results. But 0:17:08.000 --> 0:17:10.680 the results have shown that the old mice have improved 0:17:10.760 --> 0:17:14.600 muscular and cognitive function and the they have younger looking 0:17:14.640 --> 0:17:18.119 tissues at a cellular level when continually exposed to the 0:17:18.119 --> 0:17:20.680 blood of young mice in this way. On the other hand, 0:17:20.720 --> 0:17:23.680 the young mice do not seem too fair as well 0:17:23.800 --> 0:17:26.720 from this procedure. Uh there there seems to be a 0:17:27.160 --> 0:17:30.840 sort of compensating not so great effect for them. But 0:17:31.240 --> 0:17:34.119 in some studies in rodents, they think they've isolated a 0:17:34.119 --> 0:17:38.480 protein called g DF eleven for growth differentiation factor eleven, 0:17:38.760 --> 0:17:41.920 as a major contributor to the rejuvenation effects. Though since 0:17:41.960 --> 0:17:44.000 the podcast on this we did, I think I've read 0:17:44.040 --> 0:17:47.840 a couple of articles questioning the primacy of g DF 0:17:47.960 --> 0:17:52.160 eleven as as the factor affecting this rejuvenation. Uh So, 0:17:52.640 --> 0:17:55.040 as you can tell from that, the research is still ongoing, 0:17:55.080 --> 0:17:57.119 and it would be premature to say that the blood 0:17:57.119 --> 0:18:00.880 of the young is this fountain of youth or whatever. 0:18:01.119 --> 0:18:05.080 We should have an alternative phrase, the hose of infancy. 0:18:06.240 --> 0:18:14.919 So health recommend nuts the spigot of infancy, spat of 0:18:16.040 --> 0:18:19.080 spigot of infancy, come on adolescence. I'm not sure if 0:18:19.119 --> 0:18:21.280 infancy is where I want to go back to. No, 0:18:21.440 --> 0:18:25.480 we will Benjamin Button all the way. I haven't seen 0:18:25.520 --> 0:18:27.720 that movie, so I don't know what that means better 0:18:27.760 --> 0:18:33.800 than my suggestion of prepubiscent dip. Wow. Okay, yes it 0:18:33.920 --> 0:18:37.479 is the spigot of health. Yeah. No, it is not 0:18:37.600 --> 0:18:40.440 necessarily been shown to be this A Researchers are usually 0:18:40.520 --> 0:18:43.040 quick to point out that the technique hasn't been shown 0:18:43.040 --> 0:18:46.520 to make animals immortal or even necessarily increase the lifespan. 0:18:47.040 --> 0:18:49.840 But what research we have seen is interesting, particularly with 0:18:49.880 --> 0:18:54.320 reference to potential treatment for specific diseases like Alzheimer's, where 0:18:54.760 --> 0:18:58.639 you might be able to see uh targeted rejuvenation of 0:18:58.720 --> 0:19:02.560 cells that have seen some kind of deterioration due to 0:19:02.600 --> 0:19:06.280 an age related disease. And so it could be that 0:19:06.320 --> 0:19:08.880 with some of these things we talked about today, they 0:19:08.960 --> 0:19:12.119 might not make you younger or make you live longer, 0:19:12.160 --> 0:19:15.360 but they might turn out to help with some particular 0:19:15.480 --> 0:19:19.919 disease which may or may not be age related. It 0:19:20.000 --> 0:19:21.560 kind of goes into something that we say on the 0:19:21.600 --> 0:19:26.000 show all the time, which is that, uh, scientific experimentation 0:19:26.200 --> 0:19:30.480 and exploration can lead to answers to questions that we 0:19:30.480 --> 0:19:34.119 weren't even specifically looking at at the time, and it 0:19:34.480 --> 0:19:38.200 requires very rigorous follow up to make certain that those 0:19:38.240 --> 0:19:43.840 answers are in fact valid. But it is well, yeah, no, 0:19:43.880 --> 0:19:46.479 I'm I'm sorry, I'm loving I I It just occurred 0:19:46.520 --> 0:19:49.080 to me that like that basically, like we are constantly 0:19:49.080 --> 0:19:52.520 just going like, well the answer is forty two. Well, 0:19:52.520 --> 0:19:54.080 I just think like if you if you were to 0:19:54.160 --> 0:19:57.880 do an experiment and you get an unexpected outcome, then 0:19:57.920 --> 0:20:01.400 obviously you need to uh re examine that and see 0:20:01.400 --> 0:20:04.400 if it's replicable and then get down to the question 0:20:04.440 --> 0:20:07.280 of what is it that's actually happening. Yeah. But another 0:20:07.320 --> 0:20:09.760 thing that this springs up is we sort of mentioned 0:20:09.800 --> 0:20:13.280 this earlier, but just to highlight it again, there are 0:20:13.359 --> 0:20:18.120 multiple different goals they're sort of encompassed by by rejuvenation research. 0:20:18.720 --> 0:20:21.760 One of them would be increasing lifespan. Another would be 0:20:21.760 --> 0:20:25.399 making old body tissues look like young body tissues and 0:20:25.440 --> 0:20:28.520 work as well as them. Yeah, like like a good 0:20:28.720 --> 0:20:31.040 uh you know, a good pair of kidneys or a 0:20:31.040 --> 0:20:34.040 good heart, all of that kind of stuff that does 0:20:34.080 --> 0:20:37.119 tend to decrease its efficiency over time. Yeah, and another 0:20:37.160 --> 0:20:40.240 thing would just be, uh doing this in a way 0:20:40.280 --> 0:20:42.800 that leads to a good quality of life. For example, 0:20:42.880 --> 0:20:46.920 we already know of one thing in animals that leads 0:20:46.920 --> 0:20:50.919 to increased lifespans, you know this caloric restriction. If you 0:20:51.000 --> 0:20:54.560 are willing to starve yourself too nearly to death on 0:20:54.600 --> 0:21:00.439 a constant basis annual, probably live longer in a laboratory setting. Unfoly, 0:21:00.920 --> 0:21:04.439 the thing that happens along with this, uh, this boost 0:21:04.480 --> 0:21:08.080 in longevity is a complete shutdown of the immune system. 0:21:08.119 --> 0:21:10.280 So if you're just wandering out around the world full 0:21:10.320 --> 0:21:13.040 of germs, then probably that's not going to fare very 0:21:13.040 --> 0:21:15.199 well for you. Oh yeah, that's a good thing to 0:21:15.200 --> 0:21:18.280 point out. But also it just sounds miserable. I mean, 0:21:18.320 --> 0:21:20.480 people don't want to live this way. No, I I 0:21:20.560 --> 0:21:24.240 certainly don't. Food is probably the most important thing to me. Um. 0:21:24.880 --> 0:21:26.800 This research, by the way, was from It was just 0:21:26.840 --> 0:21:29.760 published in March sixteen and it came out of the 0:21:29.960 --> 0:21:34.680 Leibnitz Institute on Aging out of Germany. And yeah, so 0:21:34.920 --> 0:21:37.600 uh so, so don't so don't totally restrict your calories 0:21:37.640 --> 0:21:40.160 down to nothing in the hopes of getting better longevity. 0:21:40.160 --> 0:21:42.239 It probably won't work. Well, maybe you should if you 0:21:42.760 --> 0:21:44.399 can live that way and want to live in the 0:21:44.680 --> 0:21:53.200 bubble boy suit and no, yeah, I mean it's very fetching, right, Yeah, 0:21:53.240 --> 0:21:56.159 this is is it living? If you can't snuggle with 0:21:56.200 --> 0:21:59.600 a dog on your face? It's interesting to me because 0:21:59.720 --> 0:22:03.480 that Clorican, the cloric intake research, that stuff that's been 0:22:03.520 --> 0:22:06.240 going on since like the nineteen thirties. Yeah, so this 0:22:06.320 --> 0:22:09.439 is uh, you know, it goes to show like that 0:22:09.520 --> 0:22:13.520 research began in the nineteen thirties, we're still looking into 0:22:14.080 --> 0:22:18.840 the effects today. That to me is a big indicator 0:22:19.000 --> 0:22:22.360 of how challenging it is. This this idea of how 0:22:22.400 --> 0:22:26.280 do we rejuvenate, how do we combat aging? It's not 0:22:26.359 --> 0:22:29.080 like it's a new question. It is something that has 0:22:29.720 --> 0:22:33.320 been going on for a while. So that's an interesting, 0:22:33.480 --> 0:22:37.119 uh note. I think I agree with you. But then again, 0:22:37.160 --> 0:22:42.040 there are also new technologies and techniques and bits of 0:22:42.119 --> 0:22:44.600 knowledge that are coming out that could be very well 0:22:44.640 --> 0:22:49.360 accelerating our our knowledge on how to combat aging. One 0:22:49.359 --> 0:22:52.480 of them, I think is this interesting idea of the 0:22:52.800 --> 0:22:56.399 clearing out of sinescence cells as one possible way to 0:22:57.200 --> 0:22:59.880 reverse the effects of aging. So I was reading about this. 0:23:00.200 --> 0:23:03.560 There was a study published in Nature in by Mayo 0:23:03.640 --> 0:23:07.639 clinic researchers Darren Baker and Jan Van Deerson, and it 0:23:07.760 --> 0:23:10.680 was the latest to suggest that if you clear out 0:23:10.800 --> 0:23:13.640 sinescence cells from the body. Remember these are the cells 0:23:13.640 --> 0:23:16.040 who were talking about earlier. That are the retired cells. 0:23:16.080 --> 0:23:19.679 They're they're done dividing and making new happy cells. You 0:23:19.880 --> 0:23:21.840 if you clear those out of the body, you can 0:23:21.880 --> 0:23:25.879 rejuvenate tissue and perhaps live longer. So Baker and vin 0:23:25.920 --> 0:23:28.879 Jerson found that if you're able to remove sinescence cells 0:23:28.920 --> 0:23:31.960 from the bodies of mice, those mice live about twenty 0:23:33.160 --> 0:23:37.960 longer on average. So we mentioned these sinescence cells earlier. 0:23:38.000 --> 0:23:41.000 But what do they do once they sit around in 0:23:41.040 --> 0:23:44.000 the body so they retire. It turns out they have 0:23:44.240 --> 0:23:47.800 some not so friendly side effects. There might be beneficial 0:23:47.840 --> 0:23:50.560 effects to um. We can talk about those if you want, 0:23:51.040 --> 0:23:54.119