Will Humans Ever Live Forever?

Why do we die? Did I put that question well or maybe I should have said why do our bodies stop working at a particular age even though we do not die from an accident, a disease, or trauma? You might want to use the word old age but is that true because every autopsy done either on an aged person or a young person comes back with a cause of death, which means there is always a reason why our body or the heart stops working.

As we age, our cells are unable to recover from traumas and are unable to reproduce and when this happens, these cells become senescent which means that they go into resting or hibernation mode. At this point, they are damaged and they can also lead to the damage of tissues that they make up which can lead to the death of that tissue.

While the cause for cells inability to heal and reproduce isn't still known, we cannot but agree that it is as a result of molecular changes in the body. Cases of mutation caused by genotoxic chemicals, replication errors, UV light, free radicals, and ionizing radiation can lead to protein not properly functioning, or misread proteins which can lead to cell death because without protein, the cells cannot function.

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I was looking through a study, and it has been shown that there is a relationship between flawed mutilated DNA and the age of a person. One instance is telomere and cell division. When cells divide, the telomeres in the DNA of the cells become shorter and this continues until the telomere is too short that division cannot take place again.

In the race to live longer than what we currently have, humans have been trying a lot of things. In doing so, scientists have been looking into IGF1 hormones for longevity as a research on nematode showed that it increased the lifespan of the nematode. Scientists have also been looking at using IGF1 drugs to increase the longevity of dogs but this strategy doesn't look like it will work for you and I. Another problem with getting on longevity research is finding people who are willing to participate in the trial.

But then, why will I want to live till 150 years when I will have to be taking pills for blood pressure and so on. So it looks like there is more to target and solve before we can look at humans enjoying longevity. Scientists are also looking at other ways to help with longevity such as limiting calories, and getting the body to run on less food and this process is still being investigated.

While there are a lot of research by scientists, in other for us to come to an agreement on what would work for longevity, we need to agree on a maker and scientist need to show that an improvement in the maker will improve longevity. Asides from that, whatever we are introducing needs to be reliable, efficient and safe to take but then, I do not think we will need just one maker.

REFERENCE

^{https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6908713/
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/brv.12959
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5679293/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10798888/
https://www.nature.com/articles/s43587-022-00291-z
https://www.nature.com/articles/nature19793
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10522-008-9156-4
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9853412/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9261384/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6417653/
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13543784.2021.1939306}