An open access commentary: “Aging is now viewed as a plastic phenotype that can be altered by nutritional, pharmacological and genetic manipulations. However, most pro-longevity mutations are discovered by systematic gene deletion or RNA interference screens, which mainly reveal abolished or diminished gene functions. In our recent publications, we used global acetylation proteome screens to study aging in yeast, and showed that enhancing the function of certain genes through specific acetylation can promote longevity. … It is well known that acetylation of histone proteins in cultured human fibroblasts decreases during aging, which is believed to be directly related to decreased metabolic rate and reproductive capacity associated with aging. However, histone deacetylation is not likely to be a universal driving force of aging because histone acetylation and deacetylation mimetics similarly shortened life span, which could simply reflect nonspecific fitness decreases in both instances. Extension of lifespan promoted by certain genetic and/or pharmacological perturbations will more likely lead to identification of bona fide regulatory factors of aging. … Aging is conventionally thought to be characterized by accumulation of molecular, cellular, and organ damage, leading to increased vulnerability to disease and death. Our data, on the contrary, support the idea that the gradual loss of a crucial component promoting ‘healthy young status’ might underlie an intrinsic aging process. Many of the mutations that extend life span decrease the activity of external nutrient signaling, such as the IGF (insulin-like growth factor)/insulin and the TOR (target of rapamycin) pathways, suggesting that they may induce a metabolic state similar to that resulting from periods of food shortage.”

Link: http://impactaging.com/papers/v3/n10/full/100398.html

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Teeth are one of the first parts of our body to become seriously damaged as the years go by, thanks to bacterial agents, but that will soon enough be a thing of the past. On the one hand enamel regeneration is close to realization, and on the other hand so are ways of eliminating the agents of tooth decay: “A new mouthwash developed by a microbiologist at the UCLA School of Dentistry is highly successful in targeting the harmful Streptococcus mutans bacteria that is the principal cause tooth decay and cavities. In a recent clinical study, 12 subjects who rinsed just one time with the experimental mouthwash experienced a nearly complete elimination of the S. mutans bacteria over the entire four-day testing period. … This new mouthwash is the product of nearly a decade of research conducted by Wenyuan Shi … Shi developed a new antimicrobial technology called STAMP (specifically targeted anti-microbial peptides) [which] acts as a sort of ’smart bomb,’ eliminating only the harmful bacteria and remaining effective for an extended period. … With this new antimicrobial technology, we have the prospect of actually wiping out tooth decay in our lifetime.”

Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/11/111116045657.htm

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From h+ Magazine: “As serious life extension appears on an ever nearer horizon simultaneous with a period of social and economic rebellion and an increasing sense of global chaos, this may be a good time to entertain these anxieties while thinking beyond the two extant competing simplistic arguments. The current conflicting views seem to be these: A: Hyperlongevity will be for rich people only and we can’t afford to add to the population vs. B: Technologies get distributed to more and more people at an increasing rate of speed through the auspices of the free market. Demand increases. Production increases. The price gets lower. Demand increases. Production increases. The price gets lower… ad infinitum. In fact, the wealthy who are the early adopters of a new technology get to spend a lot of money on crappy versions of new technologies that are not ready for prime time. At the risk of being obvious, it seems like there’s a lot of room in the middle for more nuanced, less certain views. … Very few people would say that we shouldn’t cure cancer or heart disease because only the wealthy will be able to afford it – and those who did would be seen by most as anti-human and/or insufferably whiny. Seen in this light, it becomes obvious that this whole ‘only the rich will get hyperlongevity’ mentality is pathetic in the extreme – a concession of defeat before the outset. If you think optimal health and longevity should be distributed, you won’t say, ‘Well, it won’t be distributed so I’m against it.’ You will try to make sure it gets distributed. Whether you believe in medical care for all through government or pushing these solutions towards a very large mass market or creating an open source culture that takes production and distribution into its own decentralized hands, you’ll work or fight for one or several (or all) of these solutions.”

Link: http://hplusmagazine.com/2011/11/15/live-long-and-prosper-umm-well-get-back-to-you-on-that-prosper-bit/

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We might look on aging as damage that happens as a stochastic, inevitable consequence of the operation of a biochemical system. So the buildup of chemical gunk between your cells is a part of aging, while those times you managed to break bones in your enthusiasm for life are not aging, despite the fact that what’s left in the wake of those unfortunate accidents is definitely damage.

There are always special cases and grey areas worth thinking about, however. Such as teeth, for example, as I was reminded earlier today. Teeth have a pretty hard time of it, actually, when you stop to think about it. Even in this modern age our teeth maintenance technologies remain woefully inadequate in the face of bacterial species that break down enamel, and so our teeth are one of the most failure-prone and damage-prone parts of the body – and they get to the point of painful dysfunction far earlier than the rest of our organs if left to their own devices.

But that isn’t aging – it’s parasitism, no more aging than the consequences of contracting malaria. It’s still something we need to fix, of course, and I post on this and related topics because it is of general interest to anyone who follows research into rejuvenation and regeneration. If most or all of us suffer a particular form of bacterial malfeasance that manages to be as damaging as that which chews upon our teeth, than dealing with that problem has to be included in any general toolkit for enhanced human longevity.

As an aside, I should note that the hard components of teeth do age:

enamel thickness related to age showed a steady decrease, beginning at approximately age 50.

There are apparently chemical composition changes, increased brittleness, and so forth – none of which seems to have much to do with the bacteria that cause cavities.

Another completely unrelated grey area is something I touch on frequently: the structural changes that take place in the <a href=adaptive immune system due to exposure to infectious agents. The adaptive component of the immune system performs throughout life just as it evolved to do – which means it devotes space and cells to remembering the pathogens it has encountered so that it can effectively destroy them in the future. But by continuing to function in this way, it becomes less and less effective over time: in later life too much of its capacity is taken up with memory cells and too little with killer cells. So quite aside from what we might think of as biological aging, the adaptive immune system succeeds itself into an increasingly broken state just by doing its job. Whether or not we call this process aging, it still has to be fixed, auch as by using targeted cell destruction therapies to eliminate memory cells and free up space.

There are other examples. But you get the point: not all of the degenerations that we suffer with advancing age are in fact aging per se, or at least they will not fit into the usefully narrow definitions of aging that I find helpful. They will still need to be addressed, prevented, and their consequences repaired.

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rechargingqigong.com http Internal exercises increase your chances of a long and healthy life.

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Longevity medicine - Video

The UCLA Longevity Center, a non-profit organization dedicated to enhancing and extending productive and healthy lives through research and education honors multi-award winning actress Jane Fonda, entrepreneur and philanthropist James A. Collins and Founding Director of the Jules Stein Eye Institute, Bradley R

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UCLA Longevity Center 20th Anniversary ICON Awards Gala - Video

We all want to live long, happy and healthy lives – and taking care of our hearts is an essential part of good health and longevity. In this blog I want to tell you a bit about cholesterol and how this complex substance relates to heart disease. In an upcoming blog we’ll look at how to prevent the build-up of the wrong kinds of cholesterol so that we can maintain or restore good heart health.

There was a time when doctors thought of cholesterol as a single compound. We now know that cholesterol actually comes in a wide variety of sizes and shapes, and the names we give to these types are based on their density. The lightest and most buoyant cholesterol is now classed as “very low density lipoprotein” or VLDL. For a variety of reasons, VLDL is the most problematic form of cholesterol you can have in your bloodstream. The second common form of cholesterol is abbreviated “LDL,” which stands for low-density lipoprotein. This form of cholesterol is the most plentiful in most human beings. LDL poses a problem for us because it is easily oxidized into a form which triggers inflammatory reactions within the bloodstream – and as we’ll see below, that is a critical step in developing plaque deposits. Two more common forms of cholesterol are called intermediate density lipoprotein, or IDL, and high-density lipoprotein or HDL.

“Plaque” is the thick, viscous layer that builds up inside the artery walls and blocks the blood flow to the heart. Plaque is generated when LDL cholesterol, the most common form, is damaged or oxidized within your bloodstream by either blood sugar or free radicals. Your immune system sees this damaged LDL as an undesirable substance and sends white blood cells, the same ones tasked with destroying bacterial invaders, to attack and engulf the damaged LDL cholesterol. They do this so efficiently that the white blood cells rapidly become filled with cholesterol until they look under the microscope like they are filled with foam.  For this reason we call them “foam cells.” These foam cells then migrate through the lining of the artery to a position over the muscular layer that forms the arterial wall, gradually growing in thickness. This build-up is called plaque.

Plaque progressively narrows the opening on the interior of the artery so that there is less and less room for blood to pass through. As the arteries have less and less capacity to carry blood to the heart muscle our ability to exercise begins to decline and we start feeling a bit tired. Most of the time we simply pass this fatigue off as a normal consequence of aging – but it is not. It is in fact an early sign of heart disease. Often those in the beginning stages of heart disease experience few obvious symptoms: for example, chest pain during exercise will usually not develop until more than 90% of the opening within the artery has been narrowed.

The plaque lining the artery underneath the intima (the innermost layer inside the artery) is a thick, inflammatory mass, which causes a great deal of irritation along the inside of the artery. Sometimes this plaque will cause so much irritation that it actually erodes through the artery and bursts through into the blood stream. This massive inflammatory discharge triggers the almost instantaneous formation of a clot, which will completely block off the blood flow through that artery. This is a heart attack. All of the heart muscle that depends on the blood flow from that now clogged artery is in risk of dying. If the amount of heart muscle deprived of blood is too large the patient may suddenly die without warning. If the area is small enough the patient will suffer symptoms we’ve heard of, and many have experienced: chest pain, shortness of breath, nausea, and sweating. The next step is a quick trip to the hospital for emergency care. Fortunately the ER doctors now have clot buster drugs available in the emergency room to dissolve the clot rapidly and resume the flow of blood to the heart muscle, minimizing the amount of damage. But that assumes the patient gets treatment in time.

Interestingly, about one third of heart attacks are small enough that the patient never recognizes they’ve occurred. We often find evidence of these on routine EKGs done during physical examinations. These people are often shocked to discover that they have had a heart attack at some time in the past. On careful questioning we often discover a time in which they suddenly felt fatigued, lethargic and under the weather for a few days. This was probably when the blood supply to a small piece of heart muscle was actually shut off without the patient knowing it.

At Longevity Medical Clinic, we want our patients to learn that problems like heart disease are both preventable and reversible. That’s why it’s important to know what’s going on inside your body. In the next heart disease blog I will explain more about heart attacks – and how to prevent them.

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(May 11, 2010) Marcia Stefanick talks about the medical differences between men and women and how the different chemical makeups of the different sexes can affect a person's health and longevity. During the final quarter of the Stanford Mini Med School, some of the most timely and important topics in contemporary medicine and the biosciences are addressed

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Sex and Gender Differences in Health

http://www.energeticbalancing.us, Energetic Balancing, Energy, Energy Balancing, Energetic Rebalancing, Frequency Balancing, Information Balancing, Information Medicine, Energy Medicine, Naturopathic Medicine, Homeopathy, Alternative Medicine, Spiritual Balancing, Healing, Spiritual Healing, Longevity, Physical Immortality, Anti-Aging, Eternal Life, Prayer

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Vital Energetic Balancing Presentation Part 1 - Video

When it comes to health, people often say, “Genetics is destiny.” In other words, you were born pre-wired for the condition of your health today. Is that true? Well – yes and no.

When I was a lad in medicine, the great debate was over “Nature vs. Nurture.”  We were taught the prevailing wisdom that there were aspects of our lives that were determined by our genetic code and others that were a function of our environment.  The debate concerned which factors fell into which category.  Based on the medical knowledge we have today, it turns out that much of the intellectual and emotional energy of that debate was wasted.  Now we know that a great deal of what we call “our genetic predisposition” is dramatically influenced by our environment. In other words, Nature is significantly affected by Nurture.

Of course, this doesn’t mean your genes actually change.  They were fixed when the egg and sperm provided by your parents first came together and you started to grow.  The error we made in the Nature vs. Nurture debate was in oversimplifying what our genetic code actually consisted of.  It turns out that a great number of our genes actually seem to operate like on/off switches.  Those switches can be flipped off or on depending on our environment, behavior, and even our emotional state – that is, depending on the choices we make.

We have now identified genetic patterns that indicate whether a patient is at risk of developing a variety of diseases.  Let me give you an important example.  There is a genetic marker called EPO4 that indicates that a patient has a greatly increased risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease before age 60.  But not everyone with this genetic marker will get Alzheimer’s disease at any age.  It turns out that people who have this genetic trait can literally “switch” the EPO4 genetic trait on or off depending on their behavior.  If you over-eat, refuse to exercise, continue to smoke, drink too much alcohol, or allow yourself to become a Type II diabetic, you will switch this genetic marker into its active phase in many cases and multiply your risk of contracting early-onset dementia.  On the other hand, if you adopt patterns of healthy living – drink plenty of antioxidant-rich green tea, stay lean, exercise regularly, avoid excess alcohol, and use supplements that decrease inflammation and have potent antioxidant effects – your risk of becoming an Alzheimer’s victim – no matter what your genetic markers say – is extremely low.  Since the great majority of Americans maintain a consistently and stubbornly unhealthy lifestyle, those with the EPO4 genetic marker will tend to have a very high risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease before age 60.  But for those few wise men and women who recognize their risk and modify their behavior appropriately, their risk of Alzheimer’s disease can be dramatically decreased, by as much as 80% compared with those with less wisdom.

The same process appears to be true for Type II diabetes, most cancers, many forms of heart disease, and the most common type of stroke.  There are genetic patterns that predispose people to greater risk of all of these conditions – but whether or not those genetic switches flip on or off can be determined to a large degree by diet, lifestyle, and proper use of dietary supplements.  Yes, we’ve all heard of those lucky people whose genetic patterns are such that they can lead horrible lifestyles, eat in the most self-destructive manner conceivable, drink too much, smoke like chimneys, and yet manage to avoid virtually all of the expected consequences.  These lucky souls seem to have won the genetic lottery.  And, sadly, there are a few people on the other end of the genetic spectrum who seem to do everything right but are doomed by their genetic patterns to a life of chronic health problems. We don’t always know why some men and women seem prone to catastrophic health conditions like cancer, heart disease, depression, or dementia.

But I have good news – and better news. For the vast majority of us who fall somewhere between these two genetic extremes, our diet, lifestyle, and use of supplements can have a dramatic impact on how well we live, how long we live, and most importantly, how joyously we live. The better news is this: those genetic switches can be moved back into their healthy positions even relatively late in life.  People with atherosclerotic heart disease, diabetes, and even early dementia can often turn their diseases around to a remarkable degree by changing the way they live, the foods they eat, and the supplements and medications they take.  At Longevity Medical Clinic this is our forte!  While a very large percentage of our patients have made some bad choices and are now reaping some negative consequences from those choices, it’s not too late. One of the most important things we do is to help our patients change their lives in such a way as to “flip those switches” back into the safe position.  Not only do we reduce further damage, but we can also help restore the kind of vibrant, joyful life that some of our patients feared they would never experience again.

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A primer on the promises and pitfalls of the next revolution in healthcare. Since the mapping of the human genome in 2000, we've heard a lot about the promise of genetics in the field of medicine

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Personalized Medicine - Video

Capture the QI of the Universe,With The Antique Tradition of PENGZU QIGONG by Master LIU Dehua.

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LI WU JI - Video

Learn More at http://www.Lifefood.com Filmed at Jubbs Longevity 508 E 12th Street New York, NY

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Healing Cancer - Dr Jubb - The Universe Inside Our Mind - Video

Video Interview with Dr Edmund Chein Part 1

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Dr. Edmund Chein,MD on 2009 Nobel Prize in Medicine pt 1 - Video

Author of New York Times best-seller, "The Singularity is Here" explains how "exponential growth" has been driving the advances in technology information and why this dynamic now applies to health and medicine. Presentation at the 2009 Longevity Conference in Manhattan Beach, CA, on November 13, 2009. More information at: manhattanbeachproject and at maxlife.org

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Part 2: Ray Kurzweil Addresses the 2009 Longevity Conference - Video

When a diabetic no longer needs medication and has normal blood sugars – do we call it remission or do we call it a cure?

Assume for a moment that you’re a diabetic.  Your fasting blood sugar is 214.  Your hemoglobin A1c – the component of hemoglobin to which glucose is bound – is an unhealthy 7.9.  You are taking nine pills per day in an effort to control your blood sugar, but it does not seem to be working.  This means you are a poorly controlled type 2 diabetic, and your risk of experiencing the deadly effects of unchecked diabetes – heart attacks, strokes, dementia, blindness, kidney failure, loss of sensation in your extremities and amputations – is significantly elevated.

Now, let’s consider a different scenario.

You are a patient at Longevity Medical Clinic. Since we started treating your type 2 diabetes, we have restored your hormone balance to that of a 25-year-old.  Your immune system is more robust and competent than it has been in decades.  Your body fat has dropped from 30% to 15%.  You are lean, strong, and fitter than you were in high school.  You eat a near ideal diet and workout regularly 3 to 5 times per week.  Your fasting blood sugar is now 85, and your hemoglobin A1c is a healthy 5.3.  You are maintaining these great blood sugar levels and yet are taking no diabetic medications whatsoever. The big question: what do we call you?  Are you in remission, or are you cured?

This is the current state of debate in medicine.  A large percentage of type 2 diabetics still make perfectly adequate amounts of insulin.  The problem is that they have developed significant insulin resistance.  If we correct the insulin resistance, their diabetes will essentially disappear.  There are at least two ways to accomplish this.  The first, called bariatric surgery, is more invasive and brings higher risk; nevertheless, this surgery will correct insulin resistance in about 85% of surgery patients.  The less risky path to overcoming insulin resistance, combining aggressive hormonal treatments with significant lifestyle changes, can potentially eliminate symptoms of diabetes in roughly 70% of people.

In 2009, the International Consensus Committee decided that it was probably most appropriate to refer to a diabetic whose robust good health has been restored as “in remission” – not “cured.”  Their reasoning is that most people will eventually return to the old lifestyle that caused the disease in the first place, creating a high probability that they will once more become diabetic.  This reasoning makes sense, based on the behavior of all too many people. But this same committee admitted that the “remission” versus “cure” debate is mostly a matter of opinion, not really based on objective science.

My view is simple. Instead of resting on opinion, preferences, or social and political pressures, I prefer to use the term “cure.” If a person has normal blood sugar and normal insulin levels and is not taking any diabetes medications, I am hard pressed to consider them a diabetic.  But at the same time, I certainly agree that any patient who returns to the lifestyle that caused the diabetes in the first place will almost certainly cause it to recur. Let me give you an analogy from my own experience. Several years ago when I was skiing (in my usual less than cautious manner), I took a nasty fall and broke my left hip.  Today, other than some bony callus at the site of healing, and some scarring on the bone, I have no current evidence of a fractured hip.  I run, I jump, I leap and cavort, and I also continue to ski in a less than cautious manner!  That means I am certainly at risk of fracturing my hip a second time.  Am I cured, or am I in remission? I would say that my hip fracture has been cured, but using the reasoning of the medical community my fracture would be in remission, since my lifestyle might cause me to break my hip again at some time in the future. Sounds like silly reasoning, doesn’t it?

To sum up: the vast majority of people with type 2 diabetes make plenty of insulin.  Their blood sugar is high because they have developed severe insulin resistance.  We know how to correct insulin resistance and to restore patients to health.  The big question that we are now arguing about is not so much whether it can be done, but what we should call it when we have done it.  Some people seem outraged when we suggest that some type 2 diabetics can be cured.  I sincerely don’t want to upset them, so if they prefer, they can substitute the words “in remission” for cured.  I frankly don’t care what we call it.  What I do care about is helping those people with high blood sugars, high insulin, and a high risk of devastating consequences to overcome their problems and lead a longer, healthier life. That’s what we’re working to do every day at Longevity Medical Clinic.

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Most of you know that I’m on the radio several times each month, taking calls from listeners with health concerns. I’ve noticed that one of the most frequent worries among female radio listeners seems to be osteoporosis – the loss of bone density often associated with age.  Here at Longevity Medical Clinic, the approach we always prefer to beat osteoporosis is to rebuild a patient’s natural bone density by restoring the level of endocrine support typically found in younger women. This is a much different and more far-reaching solution than the one preferred by the pharmaceutical industry, which favors using prescription drugs such as Fosamax. 

But here’s some interesting news. A study published a few months ago in the British Journal of Nutrition offers a simple, cheap, and tasty method of helping a woman to protect her bones.  Researchers found that consuming three ounces of prunes each day for one year resulted in a significant increase in bone density.  The study group included 238 postmenopausal women.  One half of the women consumed about three ounces of dried prunes per day, while the other half ate about three ounces of dried apples per day.  After one year the sample groups were compared using X-ray studies of multiple bone sites along with serum markers of bone turnover (the body’s natural process of replacing old bone with new bone).  The women who consumed the prunes were found to have significantly greater bone density than those who consumed the apples! 

So while an apple a day may indeed keep the doctor away, three or four prunes per day are more likely to give grandma stronger bones.

Of course, prunes don’t begin to provide all the other benefits that a woman derives from restoring youthful endocrine support.  As our patients at Longevity Medical Clinic can attest, achieving a more youthful hormone balance dramatically improves a woman’s mood, slows brain shrinkage, prevents hot flashes, and makes her skin looked 20 or 30 years younger. At the same time a youthful hormone balance will shift a woman’s metabolism away from fat and towards muscle. It even kick-starts her desire for romance and her physical capacity to enjoy it. And as if all that weren’t enough, we’ve found that proper hormone balance helps prevent hair loss, lowers the risk of heart attacks and strokes, and generally helps a women feel and function like someone much younger. 

So I guess the bottom line is this: if you’re only concerned with your bones, and you’re willing to ignore the rest of your body and brain, prunes may do the trick. But if all those other benefits are important – and they are! – I suggest that consulting with the doctors here at Longevity Medical Clinic might be a worthwhile option for you. You’ll not only avoid osteoporosis, but you’ll improve your overall health and your quality of life dramatically. Give us a call and see for yourself.

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PATIENT TESTIMONIAL

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MICHAEL D. BOROOKHIM, MD, INC. 310-288-0881 - Video

From Cryonics Magazine: “As a neuroscientist whose day job is to map neural circuits, I know exactly what type of evidence is needed to convince the scientific community that cryonics preserves the neural circuits encoding our unique memories and personality. What is required is a systematic whole-brain survey with an electron microscope. Recently I, along with my colleagues John Smart and Jacob DiMare, formed the Brain Preservation Foundation (BPF) to promote new scientific research in the field of whole brain preservation for long-term static storage. The BPF has announced the Brain Preservation Technology Prize (purse currently at $106,000) for the first team to demonstrate that an entire large mammalian brain can be preserved for long-term storage such that the connectivity between neurons remains intact and traceable using today’s electron microscopic imaging techniques. A complete set of rules for the prize can be found on our BPF website. … This prize is being presented as a challenge to cryonics providers like Alcor and their research partners: ‘Demonstrate the quality of your product in a rigorous, independent, and open way to the scientific community and to your customers.’ The BPF is hard at work raising funds to promote this prize and to help perform the electron microscopic evaluation required, and we are recruiting a board of scientific advisors and judges that will give the prize credibility.”

Link: http://www.alcor.org/magazine/2011/06/07/the-brain-preservation-technology-prize/

Allow me to point you to an attractively blunt assessment of the human condition from the Russian end of the rejuvenation research advocacy community, tidied up a little after the automated translation made a hash of it:

Needless to say, a catastrophe – something unpleasant. Global catastrophe – unpleasant globally. And what is the most global of global catastrophes? Probably the one that leads to widespread death. And here we must note that if nothing is done, then all living people will die with 100% probability. Of aging. Therefore, it is aging that is the global catastrophe that is unfolding silently throughout the course of human history.

“Unfolding silently” because nearly everyone in the world studiously refuses to characterize the consequences of aging for what they in fact are. Everyone will die of aging – everyone! – and that is somehow removed from the normal fervor and unified efforts that greet any other form of mass death. Take the tsunamis of recent years, for example, one of which managed to kill about as many people as die of aging in any given day. There was a global outpouring of funds, support, and activity following that tsunami. Yet every day, without cease, that many people again are killed by the effects of aging – and next to no-one cares enough to do something in response to this horrible ongoing loss of life.

This is an age of biotechnology, in which we have a good grasp on the causes of degenerative aging and how to approach treating them. The goal of producing medical technologies that can rejuvenate the old and grant additional decades of life might be accomplished within a few decades, given billions of dollars in funding and and tens of thousands of researchers and supporting workers. But that support doesn’t exist today. The peoples of the world think about aging little differently than they did a thousand years ago – they haven’t yet woken up to see what could be accomplished through medical science within their lifetimes. As a consequence of this lack of support, many, many more people will age, suffer, and die than might have been the case – ourselves included, unless we get our act together.