Healthy Life Extension
Full Rejuvenation in 5 Years?posted on November 20th, 2012
Dear Future Centenarian,
Unlikely. But there’s a possibility that fairly extensive rejuvenation could happen by then. By this, I mean in the lab, not in the clinic, unless you got your treatment in a stable country with reliable medical care that does not have onerous regulatory oversight. For example, just getting approval in the US could take 5-15 years after such a technology is developed.
If you were on the Centagen webinar last Thursday, you’ll know what I am about to talk about.
Maximum Life Foundation is currently endorsing a crowdfunding initiative for Centagen. They only need about $75,000 to equip and lease some space in an existing lab to develop their adult stem cell/telomere technology.
Their chief scientist, Dr. Bryant Villeponteau, has spent most of his career in this field. In fact, some consider him to be the “Father of Telomerase Biology.” His contribution to the field earned him the “Inventor of the Year Award” in 1997. Without his work, telomerase activator supplements and drug development could be years behind where they are today.
In a nutshell, his pending lab could bring his newest technology to research facilities and some international clinics in 2-3 years. Barring unforeseen hurdles, Dr. Villeponteau could perfect the ability to amplify stem cells by a million times or more without degrading telomeres. In fact, he is confident he will be able to actually lengthen the cells’ telomeres in the process. That would make the stem cells biologically younger.
Currently, whenever cells divide, in or out of the lab, telomeres tend to shorten, thus aging the cells.
So Dr. Villeponteau could produce an unlimited number of your own cells for any and all tissues. That means you could have young replacement cells for any purpose you may need. Since these would be your own cells, ethical, rejection and safety issues disappear or diminish to a negligible level.
So any of your individual organs could be treated and even rejuvenated.
How about this concept? Several years ago, I asked famous stem cell researcher, Dr. Michael West, when, if ever, could we have a systemic approach to rejuvenation by injecting undifferentiated stem cells into a patient’s bloodstream. The idea being, that they would migrate to all organs and trigger full-body rejuvenation.
He wouldn’t speculate as to when, but he did acknowledge that this was a goal and could of course be the Holy Grail of stem cell research. He is also known as one of the brighter people on the planet.
Dr. Villeponteau has a new twist on this idea and thinks that we could start studies in less than two years and know within months whether it was working or not.
Even if it were not a complete success, he figures that it could overcome at least one barrier to solving aging and would be able to improve or maybe even obsolete every other type of stem cell therapy in the world.
By the way, indications as to him being on the right track are happening today. For example, there are now a number of reputable stem cell clinics in Panama, China, Cayman Islands and other countries. Thousands of patients have already been treated using their own stem cells with no significant side-effects reported.
Most treatments involve injecting stem cells into the patient's bloodstream rather than directly into the organs. Some of the patients being treated for one condition have reported an unexpected improvement in another condition such as significant reversal of hearing loss!
Here’s a 3 minute video of an amazing success story of a US medical doctor heart failure patient treated at a clinic in Costa Rica. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PcFQeRNuPDo
In summary, Dr. Villeponteau’s technology optimizes and amplifies patients’ stem cells before they are reinjected into them.
By the way, he may know within a few years if he can rejuvenate all your skin with one or a series of simple injections. If not, there’s a Plan B.
Here’s some more info: http://www.indiegogo.com/centagen?c=home
P.S. If you’re in the mood for a good belly laugh, here’s a brief video on learning how not to die: http://mashable.com/2012/11/17/ways-not-to-die/
LATEST HEADLINES FROM FIGHT AGING!
THE STATE OF BIOPRINTING Friday, November 16, 2012
"Desktop 3-D printers can already pump out a toy trinket, gear set or even parts to make another printer. Medical researchers are also taking advantage of this accelerating technology to expand their options for regenerative medicine. Researchers have made great strides in coaxing cells to grow over artificial, porous scaffolds that can then be implanted in the body to replace hard tissue, such as bone.
MOLECULAR TWEEZERS VERSUS ALZHEIMER'S DISEASE Friday, November 16, 2012
Here researchers are testing a new candidate method of breaking down the beta amyloid and tau associated with Alzheimer's disease: "Last March, researchers at UCLA reported the development of a molecular compound called CLR01 that prevented toxic proteins associated with Parkinson's disease from binding together and killing the brain's neurons.
ELIMINATING METASTASIS IN MELANOMA Thursday, November 15, 2012
If metastasis could be blocked many forms of cancer would become tractable and far less threatening, which is a fair-sized step towards a robust cure for cancer - very much needed as a part of any package of biotechnologies aimed at greatly extending healthy human life. Thus it is promising to see signs of early progress along these lines:
INVESTIGATING A LONGEVITY-RELATED MITOCHONDRIAL POLYMORPHISM Thursday, November 15, 2012
Thus life span differences between similar species may to a large degree reflect differences in the damage resistance of mitochondria, and a number of studies in recent years have shown that some human mitochondrial haplogroups - which represent characteristic variations in mitochondrial DNA - can be correlated with increased longevity.
INJECTABLE, COMPRESSIBLE, SHAPED TISSUE SCAFFOLD Wednesday, November 14, 2012
Here an intriguing advance in scaffold technology is noted: "Bioengineers [have] developed a gel-based sponge that can be molded to any shape, loaded with drugs or stem cells, compressed to a fraction of its size, and delivered via injection.
HUMANITY+ 2012 CONFERENCE, DECEMBER 1ST IN SAN FRANCISCO Wednesday, November 14, 2012
Revolving around the theme "Writing the Future", the conference will explore the world of media and communicating Transhumanism. Speakers include multi-award winning science fiction author Kim Stanley Robinson, acclaimed biomedical gerontologist Aubrey de Grey, designer and theorist Natasha Vita-More, futurist Jamais Cascio, science fiction author David Brin, philosopher and proactionary principle advocate Max More, national best-selling author Sonia Arrison, artificial general intelligence researcher Ben Goertzel, and more.
DIGGING DEEPER INTO ZEBRAFISH BRAIN REGENERATION Tuesday, November 13, 2012
It is possible that mammals such as we humans still have the necessary machinery, but it is turned off - or if we have lost it, that there is a way to recapture some of that loss through genetic engineering or other advanced medicine. But first, far more must be learned of the way in which regeneration proceeds in species like the zebrafish:
SENS FOUNDATION HIRING A TELOMERE BIOLOGY RESEARCH LEAD Tuesday, November 13, 2012
In typically ambitious fashion the plan is to remove the ability of humans to generate cancer by blocking all processes that can lengthen telomeres, as telomere lengthening is a function that all cancers must abuse in order to bypass normal limits on cell replication.
"SUCCESSFUL AGING" SEEMS A LITTLE RIDICULOUS AS A CONCEPT Monday, November 12, 2012
At the high level the idea is connected to compression of morbidity, pushing disability and frailty further out into old age without extending life - but are these things even possible as goals for medical science? It seems likely not: either you extend life or you don't; either you treat aging by slowing its progression or reversing it or you don't.
THE GOAL OF LIFELONG PERFECT HEALTH Monday, November 12, 2012
"I do not like to use the word immortality. It gives a very bad, a wrong impression about my work. I work on health. I am interested in ensuring that people will stay completely youthful, like young adults, for as long as they live," he said at a press conference at Ciudad de las Ideas, an annual conference about big ideas held in Puebla, Mexico.