Category Archives: Life Extension

In late 2010, during a fireside chat at the tech-industry conference TechCrunch Disrupt, the venture capitalist and entrepreneur Peter Thiel disclosed that he would award 20 enterprising teenagers $100,000 apiece over two years to bypass college in favor of entrepreneurship. Stopping out, Thiel called it. Having decried student debt (not to mention universities inculcation of political correctness), he endeavored to make the case that college was a limiting and outdated model. The Thiel Fellowship, as it came to be known, was representative of a particular strain of anti-establishmentarianism in tech-industry culture. Who needs higher education?

In Valley of the Gods: A Silicon Valley Story, Alexandra Wolfe, a reporter for The Wall Street Journal, zooms in on a handful of Thiel fellows from the 2011 inaugural class. Among them are John Burnham, an antsy teen who has his sights set on asteroid-mining robots; Laura Deming, a prodigy working on life extension; and James Proud, who founded GigLocator, an app for locating tickets to live concerts, and sold the company in 2012. As the fellows adjust to their new environs in the Bay Area, Wolfe follows them into a constellation of mentors and affiliates, subcultures and institutionsSilicon Valleys elite and underbelly. Her goal is a portrait of the tech industry as a new social order, one with an anti-society aesthetic that has taken on a singular style.

Wolfe is an entertaining writer, if not an outstanding prose stylist, and she largely lets her subjects speak for themselves, skimping on broader context. Her subjects, mostly entrepreneurs, founders, and figureheads, are indisputably more elite than underbelly, but no matter. From the futurist and author Ray Kurzweil to Todd Huffmana biologist, an early participant in the now-defunct San Francisco intentional community Langton Labs, and an aspiring cryogenically preserved corpseWolfe lands on characters who are vibrant and open-minded, each deserving of more inquiry than a 250-page book allows.

Through visits to start-up incubators, communal-living groups in mansions, and polyamorous households on Paleo diets, Wolfe constructs an argument that in Silicon Valley, institutions and routines such as raises, rents, mortgagesmarriagewere as inconsequential, breakable, and flexible as the industries technology disrupted. She deploys her anecdotes to serve her vision of the culture as a reaction to the East Coasts hierarchy, as well as its foil. She pokes fun at the tech industrys own self-aggrandizing fetishes while also affirming them. Incubators are a sort of West Coast Ivy League, a fast track to access and social capital. Millennials prefer the freedom of Silicon Valley to the old world of the East Coast. Gone is Wall Streets uniform of Thomas Pink and Tiffany; in its stead, the only outward signs of tech success are laptops and ideas. Pitting East against West even gets ontological. Using New York City hedge-fund managers as an example, Wolfe writes that the retrowealth of the East Coast is a harkening back to what it was to be human last century. Silicon Valley, by contrast, has trained its sights on how to disrupt, transgress, and reengineer humanity as a whole.

Wolfes book spans five years, but the bulk of her reporting appears to be from 2011 and 2012. And a lot happened in the years between the cocky-nerd drama of 2010s The Social Network and the first quarter of 2016, which brought zero initial public offerings from tech companies. In 2012, new start-ups were flush with money and the tech sphere was overwhelmed by ardent media coverage; the verb disrupt was elbowing its way into vernacular prominence and had not yet become a clich. Facebooks IPO was not only record-setting but a flag in the ground, and the West Coast seemed a hopeful counternarrative in an otherwise flailing economy. Stories about Silicon Valley were imbued with a certain awe that, today, is starting to fade.

Since the genres takeoff in the late 1990s, during the first dot-com boom, writing about the tech industry has traditionally fallen into a few limited camps: buzzy and breathless blog posts pegged to product announcements, suspiciously redolent of press releases; technophobic and scolding accounts heralding the downfall of society via smartphone; dry business reporting; and lifestyle coverage zeroing in on the trappings, trends, and celebrities of the tech scene. In different ways, each neglects to examine the industrys cultural clout and political economy. This tendency is shifting, as the line between tech company and regular company continues to blur (even Walmart has an innovation lab in the Bay Area). Founders and their publicists would have you believe that this is a world of pioneers and utopians, cowboy coders and hero programmers. But as tech becomes more pervasive, coverage that unquestioningly echoes the mythologizing impulse is falling out of fashion.

The backlash is unsurprising. Accelerated, venture-capital-fueled success is bound to inspire more than just wonder. In the past year alone, three Silicon Valley darlingsHampton Creek, Theranos, and Zenefitshave been subject to painful debunking by the media. Thiels own reputation, always controversial, has come into question since his financing of a lawsuit that shuttered Gawker and his emergence as an avid Donald Trump supporter. Valley of the Gods, which opens with a tribute to Thiel and the counterintuitive idealism he aimed to encourage, feels like a time capsule from a previous iteration of tech media, a reminder of the sort of narratives that have contributed to growing impatience with the mythos.

Valley of the Gods is fine as an artifact hurtled from a more innocent time, as far as scene-driven reportage is concerned. But what feels like a throwback perspective takes a toll on the larger argument of Wolfes book. She relies at every turn on stereotypes such as Aspergers Chic and engineering geeks [who]barely knew how to make friends or navigate a cocktail party, let alone be politically manipulative. Statements like Only the young and ambitious who grew up with the computer saw it for what it might become arent just vaguely ageist, but also ahistorical. (What the computer has thus far become is only one version of many potential outcomes and visions.) Peter Thiels friends, in her summation, are part of a whole new world of often-wacky people and ideas that didnt seem to subscribe to any set principles or social awareness. Leaning on Silicon Valley tropes, Wolfe fails to take her subjectsand their economic and political influence, which has only increased over the past five yearsseriously.

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She also undercuts her own point about the disruptive ethos of the place. Todays uber-nerds are like the robber barons of the industrial revolution whose steel and automobile manufacturing capabilities changed entire industries, she writes. But instead of massive factories and mills, theyre doing it with little buttons. Portraying Silicon Valleys powerful as uber-nerds who struck it rich is as reductive and unhelpful as referring to technology that integrates personal payment information and location tracking as little buttons. The effect is not only to protect them behind the shield of presumed harmlessness, but also to exempt them from the scrutiny that their economic and political power should invite.

The sort of mythology that celebrates a small handful of visionaries and co-founders blurs important social realities. Technology has always been a collective project. The industry is also cyclical. Many failed ideas have been resuscitated and rebranded as successful products and services, owned and managed by people other than their originators. Behind almost every popular app or website today lie numerous shadow versions that have been sloughed away by time. Yet recognition of the group nature of the enterprise would undermine a myth that legitimizes the consolidation of profit, for the most part, among a small group of people.

If technology belongs to the people only insofar as the people are consumers, we beneficiaries had better believe that luminaries and pioneers did something so outrageously, so individually innovative that the concentration of capital at the top is deserved. When founders pitch their companies, or inscribe their origin stories into the annals of TechCrunch, they neglect to mention some of the most important variables of success: luck, timing, connections, and those who set the foundation for them. The industry isnt terribly in touch with its own history. It clings tight to a faith in meritocracy: This is a spaceship, and we built it by ourselves.

After four years of working in tech, almost all of which were spent at start-ups in San Francisco, Ill happily acknowledge that the industry contains multitudes: biohackers and anti-aging advocates, high-flying techno-utopians and high-strung co-founders, polyamorous couples and M.B.A.s. But theyre just people, and their lifestyle choices are usually in the minority. Theyre not a new social order. Even if they were, plenty of people just like them live in New York City, too.

Valley of the Gods is journalism, not ethnography. As with any caricature, the world depicted in its pages is largely an exaggerationeven, in some cases, a fantasybut certain dimensions ring true, and loudly. Its important to note what Wolfe gets right. This is a culture that champions acceleration, optimization, and efficiency. From communication to attire, some things are more casual than they are on the East Coast, and people seem to be happier for it. Irreverence is often rewarded. This is far from punk rock (the irreverence is often in the name of building financially successful corporations), but experimentation is encouraged. Silicon Valley is hardly a meritocracydiversity metrics make that clear, and old-school credentials and pedigree still have clout out westbut its more meritocratic than other, older industries like consulting or finance. Few women figure in Wolfes book, which also feels accurate, especially at the higher levels.

The trouble with telling a Silicon Valley story is that the real stories are not just more nuanced and moderate but also relatively boring. Many people working in technology are legitimately inspiring, but they dont necessarily gravitate toward flashy projects, and wont be found strolling across a ted stage. If they fail, they may not fail up, and they certainly wont write a Medium post afterward in an attempt to micromanage their personal brand or reconfigure the narrative.

The other, less flattering truth is that the difference between the East and West Coasts is not fundamentally all that great. The tech industry owes a huge debt to the financial sector. Wolfe is eager to depict Silicon Valley as the new New York, but much of the money that funds venture-capital firms comes from investors who made their fortunes on Wall Street. (The tech industry also owes a great debt to Main Street: Private-equity funds regularly include allocations from public pension plans and universities.) Cultural differences abound, but theyre not a function of the tech industry. Theyre a function of history, of the deeply entrenched cultural and social circumstances that slowly come to define a place. As the mythology gets worn away, the contours of the Valley become easier to see. The view, though less glamorous, still offers plenty to behold.

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It's Getting Harder to Believe in Silicon Valley - The Atlantic

A globe-trotting Paolo Macchiarini once epitomized the excitement around pioneering uses for stem cells in medicine. The Italian regenerative scientist and surgeon's goal was to use stem cells to create replacement organs for the terminally ill. And only a few years ago, there were indications that he'd found a way.

Except that his patients kept dying.

So after nine headline-grabbing operations in Sweden, Russia, Britain, and the United States in which most of his patients died after receiving artificial tracheas made from plastic and coated with stem cells, Macchiarini became the focus of media and peer criticism so strong that he was dismissed by his most prestigious employer.

The Karolinska Institute in Stockholm fired him in March for breaching its "fundamental values" and damaging its reputation. Three months later, in June, Swedish police opened an investigation -- which is continuing -- into whether he might have committed involuntary manslaughter.

Meanwhile, despite the ongoing criticism of his record in Europe, Macchiarini continues to lead a research team in bioengineering and regenerative medicine at the University of Kazan, on the banks of the Volga River in Tatarstan, about 800 kilometers east of Moscow.

But there are signs his welcome in Russia may be running out. Today, Macchiarini is restricted purely to research activities in a country that previously allowed him to perform four artificial trachea transplants.

"The grant that Paolo Macchiarini has for work at Kazan Federal University is exclusively for preclinical studies and applies to creating tissue-esophageal structures to replace damaged organs in test nonhuman primates," university spokeswoman Natalia Darashkevich told RFE/RL's Russian Service recently.

Working With Baboons

The restriction to preclinical studies means Macchiarini conducts research that might later be applicable in organ transplants for humans but that he is not operating on human patients. Instead, he is working with baboons.

He also no longer works with tracheas, commonly known as windpipes, but with a different organ, the esophagus, and he no longer pursues the difficult goal of using synthetic materials for the "scaffold," or base structure, of the replacement organ. Instead, he is restricted to using biological tissues, which have been studied by researchers far longer than synthetics such as plastic, and are widely seen as a less challenging substrate on which to grow stem cells.

Roman Deev, the director of science at the Human Stem Cells Institute in Moscow, a leading Russian biotech company, has followed Macchiarini's work in Russia for many years. He told RFE/RL that the surgeon's existing grant from the Russian Science Foundation, which funds his work at Kazan Federal University, automatically expires in 2018.

Deev expressed skepticism that Macchiarini would get another research grant in Russia. "I don't consider [his work now] as something on the front line of real science," he said.

Paolo Macchiarini carrying out the world's first transplant of a synthetic trachea or windpipe on Andemariam Teklesenbet Beyene in Stockholm in 2011. The patient later died in 2014.

That is a long way from Macchiarini's early work in Russia in the late 2000s, when he was a rapidly rising star in his field. Macchiarini was initially brought to the country by Russian businessman Mikhail Batin, an enthusiastic promoter of life-extension technologies and the founder of the Science for Life Extension foundation.

Batin invited Macchiarini to perform a trachea transplant in Russia using not a synthetic trachea but one from a human cadaver. The recipient was a 26-year-old woman from neighboring Kazakhstan named Zhadrya Iglikova, whose own trachea had been seriously injured in a car accident four years earlier.

Failed Experiments

The operation took place in Russia in December 2010 and was initially celebrated by Russian media as a success. Russia's Channel One quoted Iglikova as saying afterward that she was looking forward to going back to work after rehabilitation. But then she dropped out of sight until a TV crew from Swedish national broadcaster SVT interviewed her parents in mid-2016 for a three-part documentary aired by the BBC on Macchiarini titled Fatal Experiments: The Downfall Of A Supersurgeon. The parents told the broadcaster that their daughter was unable to speak or stand and only left their home to visit health facilities.

Just six months after his first operation in Russia, Macchiarini performed his first synthetic trachea transplant in Sweden. That operation, in June 2011, propelled the surgeon to the height of fame and then to the depths of notoriety as he initially claimed full success but, 2 1/2 years later, the patient Andemariam Beyene died when the plastic trachea came loose because the stem cells had failed to fix it to his throat.

In the meantime, Macchiarini went on to perform four more synthetic-trachea transplants in Russia. His other patients were Yulia Tuulik and Aleksandr Zozulya, who died within two years of their 2012 operations; Jordanian citizen Sadiq Kanaan, who died after his operation in 2013; and Dmitry Onogda, who survived the implant in 2014 and its subsequent removal.

Paolo Macchiarini with Chris Lyle, another patient on whom he performed a trachea transplant in Stockholm in 2011. Lyles died a few months later.

Throughout his controversial career, Macchiarini has rejected any suggestions of misconduct.

"I always believed that my operation is able to help the patient," he told RFE/RL in a written response to questions about his activities.

Macchiarini also said that data he received on his patients' postoperative condition justified optimism about their progress.

"None of the reports that I had from the patients' clinicians contained information that was unexpected and concerning, and none of the clinicians raised any urgent or unresolvable issues until the very last days of the first patient's life," he wrote.

Macchiarini added that he had responded in detail to peer criticism and that "my responses to all the accusations made so far are publicly available."

As Macchiarini carries out research in Russia, he continues to come under pressure from scientists in Sweden, including former colleagues, who criticize his work.

Courageous Or Irresponsible?

In October, the editors of the respected online scientific journal, Nature Communications, appended an "Expression Of Concern" to a research report by Macchiarini and co-authors published in April 2014. The editors' note said that an investigation conducted on behalf of the Karolinska Institute had raised concerns regarding the accuracy of some of the data in the report.

In December, a group of Swedish doctors published a petition asking Russian authorities to conduct an investigation into Macchiarini's activities in Russia in light of allegations about his work in Sweden. The petition was handed to Moscow's ambassador to Stockholm but has yet to receive a response.

Still, it remains to be seen whether the criticism will realize its goal of ending Macchiarini's research career. That appears to depend on whether he is offered any new grants in Russia or elsewhere in the future.

As to whether Maccharini's once-revolutionary goal of using synthetic organs combined with stem cells as made-to-order replacement parts for humans will one day be reached, some experts say they are confident it will.

But some of them also argue that it will not be through the former superstar scientist's working methods.

"Further progress is possible, but in science you cannot move forward with giant leaps -- you need to go by small steps," Bengdt Gerdin, a retired professor of surgery at the University of Uppsala who suggested Maccharini had "relied on chance" in his research, told RFE/RL. "Can I call it courage? Perhaps this is a form of courage that borders on irresponsibility."

Excerpt from:

From Confines Of Russia, Radical Stem-Cell Surgeon Tries To Weather Scandal - RadioFreeEurope/RadioLiberty

A key piece of equipment at the Savannah River Site is being replaced after nearly 14 years of record-breaking operations performance.

Savannah River Sites Melter 2, a key component in the Defense Waste Processing Facility, is being replaced, according to a press release from contractor Savannah River Remediation.

A heater inside Melter 2 failed on Feb. 1 and is deemed not repairable. Melter 2 is only the second melter in the 20-year history of Defense Waste Processing Facility.

It has been operating nearly 14 years, approximately 12 years beyond its design life expectancy. Melter 1 ran for about six years of radioactive service and another two years of non-radioactive simulant processing.

The operational concept for Defense Waste Processing Facilityis to use a melter until it is no longer operational and then replace it with a new melter. There are no risks to the public, workers, or the environment during melter replacement.

The replacement melter, the third melter to be installed in Defense Waste Processing Facility, known as Melter 3, has been ready for years. Work to install it will begin shortly, and will required approximately six months.

Melter 2 has poured 2,819 canisters during its life, more than double what Melter 1 produced in its life span, which was 1,339 canisters. Melter 1 was placed into radioactive operation in March 1996, following approximately two years of non-radioactive simulant operations. Melter 2 began operating in 2003.

Together, Melters 1 and 2 have poured 4,158 canisters through Jan. 31, 2017. The predicted number of canisters needed to dispose of SRS high-level tank waste is 8,170, according to the SRS Liquid Waste System Plan Rev. 20.

Since beginning operations, Defense Waste Processing Facilityhas poured more than 16 million pounds of glass and has immobilized about 61 million curies of radioactivity.

Savannah River Remediation operates the Defense Waste Processing Facility, as well as other liquid waste facilities at SRS, as part of its contract with DOE. Operations are expected to continue at theDefense Waste Processing Facilityfor approximately 20 more years.

SRR keeps one melter in storage in case the working melter needs to be replaced.

Melter life extension is the product of work by engineers and scientists. The increased Melter 2 operational life resulted from the following:

Incorporating an improved insert in the melter, used from the beginning of this melters operation, ensures glass waste doesnt cause the melters pour spout to erode;

Heating the internal area where the glass flows into a canister to ensure it does not stick;

Adjusting electrical current to the electrode heaters inside the melter to increase its heating capacity; and

Installing agitation bubblers that are used to improve the heat distribution in the waste glass pool in the melter to achieve a better pour rate.

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Key piece of equipment being replaced at the Savannah River Site - Aiken Standard

The past few years seem to be setting a challenging trend for gardeners in our region and across the country. Each year from 2013 to the present seems to be getting warmer and drier, and our state has been the unfortunate recipient of a few new invasive insects that challenge gardeners.

To understand how to successfully garden in a hotter climate with longer dry spells, often less snow pack melt recharging our rivers during summer, and troublesome pests, it is important to find educational classes from a trusted source like Oregon State University Extension. Our Extension agents and Master Gardeners are trained to keep you ahead of serious new challenges.

If you dont have time to take our in-depth 11-week Master Gardener program, it would be helpful for you to attend our Spring Into Gardening Seminar held at Umpqua Community College, Wayne Crooch Hall, Saturday, Feb. 25.

The seminar is a series of gardening classes for a total fee of $30. This seminar is broken into four sections: 8:30 to 10:30 a.m., 10:30 to noon, 1 to 2:30 p.m. and 2:30 to 4 p.m. During each section, you can select one of three classes offered.

Our classes will help you understand how to modify your landscape to adapt to longer, drier summers. I have helped people go from landscapes requiring a $400 two-month water bill to a more sustainable $100 two-month bill.

Xeric landscaping will teach you what plants can tolerate a minimum of water for 4 to 5 months. The traditional lawn can be modified to an attractive landscape that includes a great variety of plants that provide color and food sources for native beneficial insects and birds.

If you are set on producing more of your own fruits and vegetables and want to do it in a low input sustainable way, we have the classes to coach you. Producing healthy food starts with great soil. Creating great garden soil is something anyone can do with the right information.

Our classes will talk about the steps needed to produce and maintain productive soil. You will hear about cover crops, biochar, soil tests, nutrient management, soil additives and if or when you should till your soil. Worm and regular composting will also be discussed as part of great soil fertility program.

If you struggle to control insect pests in your vegetable or fruit crops, we will help you understand what low-input programs work for controlling the new invasive pests, and what doesnt. You may be thinking that you dont have a large yard and really dont need to understand these issues of high water use, building great soil and invasive insect pests. We want to help educate container gardeners, too.

We will have a class that will teach you how to make hypertufa troughs (lightweight cement). These containers hold up for years, look great and are light and easy to move around your deck or porch. Well also talk about small space gardening in all kinds of containers. How to create beautiful flower containers or fresh food in a limited space.

This is our second year for including a series of classes on food preservation brought to you by the OSU Master Food Preservers. They will be teaching introduction to canning, dehydrating, fermenting foods and food storage for emergencies.

There will be one food preservation class in each of the four class sections. Bring your food preservation questions to understand the safest way to preserve your fresh produce and learn the best way to preserve food quality, flavor and nutrition.

For complete details, check the web page at http://extension.oregonstate.edu/douglas/. (Scroll down page to Upcoming Events and find the date.) Or, visit the OSU Extension office to register for this program and make your class selections. Registrations are due by Feb. 23.

Steve Renquist is the Horticulture Extension Agent for OSU Extension Service of Douglas County. Steve can be reached by e-mail at

steve.renquist@oregonstate.edu

or phone at 541-672-4461.

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Extension Spotlight: The importance of a good education | Life ... - NRToday.com

Can you slow the sands of time? The research say yes but whats the best option? (Photo: Thomas Ellis)

Most people dont want to die.

Since even before Ponce de Leon and his search for the fountain of youth, man has been on a quest to achieve immortality.

Some people think were getting closer. In recent years, caloric restriction (CR) has been demonstrated to increase lab rat lifespans more than 20%. Intermittent fasting (IF), a much lesser-known and more lifestyle-friendly alternative, has shown results that even surpass CR in some respects.

Following up on the popularity of his last post on this blog (The Science of Fat-Loss: Why a Calorie Isnt Always a Calorie), Dr. Eades examines these two options and his personal experiments with both.

If you want to live longer, this two-part article is an excellent place to start for avoiding common mistakes, pain and wasted effort.

###

Dr. Eades:

How would you like it if I told you there was a way to eat pretty much anything and everything you wanted to eat and still maintain your health? Or better yet, what if I told you that you could eat pretty much anything and everything you wanted and even improve your health? Would you be interested?

There is a way to reduce blood sugar, improve insulin sensitivity, reduce blood pressure, increase HDL levels, get rid of diabetes, live a lot longer, and still be able to lose a little weight. All without giving up the foods you love. And without having to eat those foods in tiny amounts. Sounds like a late-night infomercial gimmick, but it isnt.

When I wrote those words as the lede to an article about a year and a half ago, the idea of intermittent fasting was limited mainly to research scientists and faddists. But a number of studies had been published primarily on rodents showing that intermittent fasting led to a host of benefits that not even caloric restriction could claim.

And these werent studies published by no-name scientists laboring in backwater research departments. The lead author on many of these papers was Mark P. Mattson, Ph.D, the Chief of the Laboratory of Neurosciences and Chief of the Cellular and Molecular Neurosciences Section of the National Institute on Aging, a division of the National Institutes of Health. People were starting to take notice.

Before the work on intermittent fasting, the only real strategy for extending the lives of laboratory animals was caloric restriction (CR). If rats or mice or even primates had their calories restricted by 30-40 percent as compared to those fed ad libitum [at pleasure = as much as they want] they lived 20-30 percent longer. These studies are typically done by dividing genetically similar animals into two groups, then giving one group all the food it can eat in a day. Researchers measure the food consumed, then reduce it by 30-40 percent and give to the other group the next day. Each day this drill is repeated with the calorically restricted group getting a reduced amount of food compared to what the other group got the day before.

These CR verses ad libitum-fed studies almost uniformly demonstrate an increase in longevity in the CR animals. The CR animals not only live 30 percent or so longer, they dont develop cancers, diabetes, heart disease, or obesity. And these animals have low blood sugar levels, low insulin levels, good insulin sensitivity, low blood pressure and are, in general, much healthier physically than their ad libitum fed counterparts. But not so psychologically.

As we saw in the Keys semi-starvation study, caloric restriction isnt much fun for humans, and it apparently isnt all that much fun for the animals undergoing it either. When rats live out their ratty lives calorically restricted in their cages, they seem to show signs of depression and irritability. Primates do as well. If primates dont get enough cholesterol, they can actually become violent. But they do live longer. Even though CR has never been proven in humans, based on lab animal experience it does work. So, if youre willing to put up with irritability, hostility and depression, it might be worth cutting your calories by 30 percent for the rest of your long, healthy miserable life.

But could there be a better way?

An enterprising scientist decided to try a little twist on the CR experiment. He divided the genetically-similar animals into two groups, fed one group all it wanted and measured the intake, then fed the other group all it wanted except every other day instead of daily. When the intake of the group fed every other day was measured, it turned out that that group the intermittently fasted group ate just about double on the eat days, so that overall both groups consumed the same amount of food. Animals in the one group at X amount of food per day while the animals in the other group ate 2X amount of food every other day. So both groups ate the same number of calories but the commonality ended there.

The intermittently fasted group of animals despite consuming the same number of calories as the ad libitum fed group enjoyed all the health and longevity benefits of calorically restricted animals. In essence, they got their cake and ate it, too. They got all the benefits of CR plus some without the CR.

Intermittent fasting (IF) reduced oxidative stress, made the animals more resistant to acute stress in general, reduced blood pressure, reduced blood sugar, improved insulin sensitivity, reduced the incidence of cancer, diabetes, and heart disease, and improved cognitive ability. But IF did even more. Animals that were intermittently fasted greatly increased the amount of brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) relative to CR animals. CR animals dont produce much more BDNF than do ad libitum fed animals.

BDNF, as its name implies, is a substance that increases the growth of new nerve cells in the brain, but it does much more than that. BDNF is neuroprotective against stress and toxic insults to the brain and is somehowno one yet knows how, exactlyinvolved in the insulin sensitivity/glucose regulating mechanism. Infusing BDNF into animals increases their insulin sensitivity and makes them lose weight. Humans with greater levels of BDNF have lower levels of depression. BDNF given to depressed humans reduces their depression. And increased levels of BDNF improve cognitive ability. In short, you want as much BDNF as you can get, and with IF you if youre a lab animal at least can get a lot.

As the animal study data poured in, a few researchers began tentatively studying human subjects. A few studies appeared in the literature, and all showed positive benefits to humans who intermittently fasted. In none of the studies did subjects go completely without food for a day most had one meal per day or ate ad libitum one day and reduced consumption markedly the next.

Even some academic physicians (including Don Laub, my old mentor when I did a plastic surgery rotation at Stanford) put themselves on a modified version of an IF and wrote about it the the journal Medical Hypothesis. Since May 2003, these folks have been on a version of the IF in which they consume about 20-50 percent of their estimated daily energy requirements on the fast day and eat whatever they want on the non-fast days.

Since starting their regimen they have

observed health benefits starting in as little as two weeks, in insulin resistance, asthma, seasonal allergies, infectious diseases of viral, bacterial and fungal origin (viral URI, recurrent bacterial tonsillitis, chronic sinusitis, periodontal disease), autoimmune disorder (rheumatoid arthritis), osteoarthritis, symptoms due to CNS inflammatory lesions (Tourettes, Menieres) cardiac arrhythmias (PVCs, atrial fibrillation), menopause related hot flashes.

It all sounded good. But before I try anything out of the ordinary, and certainly before I suggest it to any of my own patients or readers, I view the idea through the lens of natural selection. In other words, I ask myself if the regimen in question would have been congruent with our Paleolithic heritage. If so, I move forward. If not, I take a long, hard look at all the biochemistry, physiology and pharmacology involved before I make any sort of recommendation.

In viewing IF through the lens of natural selection I came to the conclusion that IF was probably the way Paleolithic man ate. We modern humans have become acculturated to the three square meals per day regimen. Animals in the wild, particularly carnivorous animals, dont eat thrice per day; they eat when they make a kill. I would imagine that Paleolithic man did the same. If I had to make an intelligent guess, I would say that Paleolithic man probably ate once per day or maybe even twice every three days. In data gathered from humans still living in non-Westernized cultures in the last century, it appears that they would gorge after a kill and sleep and lay around doing not much of anything for the next day or so. When these folks got hungry, they went out and hunted and started the cycle again.

If you accept, as I do, that the Paleolithic diet is the optimal diet for modern man due to our evolved physiologies, then you should probably also buy into the idea that a meal timing schedule more like that of Paleolithic man would provide benefit as well.

With this in mind, I recruited my wife into the process and we went on an intermittent fast . It wasnt all that difficult, but I can tell you that the non-eating days were long. And the eating days were spent eating and dreading the non-eating day soon to follow.

After a few weeks, it dawned on me that we werent really following the same IF that all the lab animals were. The lab animals got food for 24 hours then went without for 24 hours. We, on the other hand, got food for about 16 hours (the waking hours) then went without for about 32 hours (8 hours sleeping, 16 hours awake and the next 8 hours sleeping). We decided to modify our fasting strategy

(Continued in Part II)

Related and Most Popular Posts: How to Lose 20 lbs. of Fat in 30 Days Without Doing Any Exercise From Geek to Freak: How I Gained 34 lbs. of Muscle in 4 Weeks The Science of Fat-Loss: Why a Calorie Isnt Always a Calorie Relax Like A Pro: 5 Steps to Hacking Your Sleep How to Travel the World with 10 Pounds or Less (Plus: How to Negotiate Convertibles and Luxury Treehouses) The Art of Letting Bad Things Happen (and Weapons of Mass Distraction)

Posted on: March 2, 2008.

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Real Life Extension: Caloric Restriction or Intermittent ...

The 100% natural curcuminoids complex in Super Bio-Curcumin is a patent-pending synergistic blend of curcuminoids and sesquiterpenoids with enhanced bioavailability and sustained retention time in the body confirmed by human clinical studies. Super Bio-Curcumin is a "next generation" in delivery of curcumin compounds that no longer requires high doses of curcumin to reach sustainable levels of curcumin in the blood plasma. Each 400 mg capsule of Super BioCurcumin is equivalent to 2772 mg of a typical 95% curcumin extract.

Directions

Take one (1) capsule daily with food, or as recommended by a healthcare practitioner.

Disclaimer These statements have not been evaluated by the FDA. These products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease.

Supplement Facts

Serving Size: 1 Vegetarian Capsules

Servings per Container: 60

*Daily value not established.

Other Ingredients: Rice flour, vegetable cellulose (capsule) vegetable stearate, silica.

Warnings

Do not take if you have gallbladder problems or gallstones. If you are taking anti-coagulents or anti-platelet medications, or have a bleeding disorder, consult your healthcare provider before taking this product.

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Life Extension Super Bio-Curcumin -- 400 mg - 60 ... - Vitacost

Life extension science, also known as anti-aging medicine, indefinite life extension, experimental gerontology, and biomedical gerontology, is the study of slowing down or reversing the processes of aging to extend both the maximum and average lifespan. Some researchers in this area, and "life extensionists", "immortalists" or "longevists" (those who wish to achieve longer lives themselves), believe that future breakthroughs in tissue rejuvenation, stem cells, regenerative medicine, molecular repair, gene therapy, pharmaceuticals, and organ replacement (such as with artificial organs or xenotransplantations) will eventually enable humans to have indefinite lifespans (agerasia[1]) through complete rejuvenation to a healthy youthful condition.

The sale of purported anti-aging products such as nutrition, physical fitness, skin care, hormone replacements, vitamins, supplements and herbs is a lucrative global industry, with the US market generating about $50billion of revenue each year.[2] Some medical experts state that the use of such products has not been proven to affect the aging process and many claims regarding the efficacy of these marketed products have been roundly criticized by medical experts, including the American Medical Association.[2][3][4][5][6]

The ethical ramifications of life extension are debated by bioethicists.

During the process of aging, an organism accumulates damage to its macromolecules, cells, tissues, and organs. Specifically, aging is characterized as and thought to be caused by "genomic instability, telomere attrition, epigenetic alterations, loss of proteostasis, deregulated nutrient sensing, mitochondrial dysfunction, cellular senescence, stem cell exhaustion, and altered intercellular communication."[7]Oxidation damage to cellular contents caused by free radicals is believed to contribute to aging as well.[8][8][9]

The longest a human has ever been proven to live is 122 years, the case of Jeanne Calment who was born in 1875 and died in 1997, whereas the maximum lifespan of a wildtype mouse, commonly used as a model in research on aging, is about three years.[10] Genetic differences between humans and mice that may account for these different aging rates include differences in efficiency of DNA repair, antioxidant defenses, energy metabolism, proteostasis maintenance, and recycling mechanisms such as autophagy.[11]

Average lifespan in a population is lowered by infant and child mortality, which are frequently linked to infectious diseases or nutrition problems. Later in life, vulnerability to accidents and age-related chronic disease such as cancer or cardiovascular disease play an increasing role in mortality. Extension of expected lifespan can often be achieved by access to improved medical care, vaccinations, good diet, exercise and avoidance of hazards such as smoking.

Maximum lifespan is determined by the rate of aging for a species inherent in its genes and by environmental factors. Widely recognized methods of extending maximum lifespan in model organisms such as nematodes, fruit flies, and mice include caloric restriction, gene manipulation, and administration of pharmaceuticals.[12] Another technique uses evolutionary pressures such as breeding from only older members or altering levels of extrinsic mortality.[13][14] Some animals such as hydra, planarian flatworms, and certain sponges, corals, and jellyfish do not die of old age and exhibit potential immortality.[15][16][17][18]

Theoretically, extension of maximum lifespan in humans could be achieved by reducing the rate of aging damage by periodic replacement of damaged tissues, molecular repair or rejuvenation of deteriorated cells and tissues, reversal of harmful epigenetic changes, or the enhancement of telomerase enzyme activity.[19][20]

Research geared towards life extension strategies in various organisms is currently under way at a number of academic and private institutions. Since 2009, investigators have found ways to increase the lifespan of nematode worms and yeast by 10-fold; the record in nematodes was achieved through genetic engineering and the extension in yeast by a combination of genetic engineering and caloric restriction.[21] A 2009 review of longevity research noted: "Extrapolation from worms to mammals is risky at best, and it cannot be assumed that interventions will result in comparable life extension factors. Longevity gains from dietary restriction, or from mutations studied previously, yield smaller benefits to Drosophila than to nematodes, and smaller still to mammals. This is not unexpected, since mammals have evolved to live many times the worm's lifespan, and humans live nearly twice as long as the next longest-lived primate. From an evolutionary perspective, mammals and their ancestors have already undergone several hundred million years of natural selection favoring traits that could directly or indirectly favor increased longevity, and may thus have already settled on gene sequences that promote lifespan. Moreover, the very notion of a "life-extension factor" that could apply across taxa presumes a linear response rarely seen in biology."[21]

Much life extension research focuses on nutritiondiets or supplementsas a means to extend lifespan, although few of these have been systematically tested for significant longevity effects. The many diets promoted by anti-aging advocates are often contradictory.[original research?] A dietary pattern with some support from scientific research is caloric restriction.[22][23]

Preliminary studies of caloric restriction on humans using surrogate measurements have provided evidence that caloric restriction may have powerful protective effect against secondary aging in humans. Caloric restriction in humans may reduce the risk of developing Type 2 diabetes and atherosclerosis.[24]

The free-radical theory of aging suggests that antioxidant supplements, such as vitaminC, vitaminE, Q10, lipoic acid, carnosine, and N-acetylcysteine, might extend human life. However, combined evidence from several clinical trials suggest that -carotene supplements and high doses of vitaminE increase mortality rates.[25]Resveratrol is a sirtuin stimulant that has been shown to extend life in animal models, but the effect of resveratrol on lifespan in humans is unclear as of 2011.[26]

There are many traditional herbs purportedly used to extend the health-span, including a Chinese tea called Jiaogulan (Gynostemma pentaphyllum), dubbed "China's Immortality Herb."[27]Ayurveda, the traditional Indian system of medicine, describes a class of longevity herbs called rasayanas, including Bacopa monnieri, Ocimum sanctum, Curcuma longa, Centella asiatica, Phyllanthus emblica, Withania somnifera and many others.[27]

The anti-aging industry offers several hormone therapies. Some of these have been criticized for possible dangers to the patient and a lack of proven effect. For example, the American Medical Association has been critical of some anti-aging hormone therapies.[2]

Although some recent clinical studies have shown that low-dose growth hormone (GH) treatment for adults with GH deficiency changes the body composition by increasing muscle mass, decreasing fat mass, increasing bone density and muscle strength, improves cardiovascular parameters (i.e. decrease of LDL cholesterol), and affects the quality of life without significant side effects,[28][29][30] the evidence for use of growth hormone as an anti-aging therapy is mixed and based on animal studies. There are mixed reports that GH or IGF-1 signaling modulates the aging process in humans and about whether the direction of its effect is positive or negative.[31]

Some critics dispute the portrayal of aging as a disease. For example, Leonard Hayflick, who determined that fibroblasts are limited to around 50cell divisions, reasons that aging is an unavoidable consequence of entropy. Hayflick and fellow biogerontologists Jay Olshansky and Bruce Carnes have strongly criticized the anti-aging industry in response to what they see as unscrupulous profiteering from the sale of unproven anti-aging supplements.[4]

Politics relevant to the substances of life extension pertain mostly to communications and availability.[citation needed]

In the United States, product claims on food and drug labels are strictly regulated. The First Amendment (freedom of speech) protects third-party publishers' rights to distribute fact, opinion and speculation on life extension practices. Manufacturers and suppliers also provide informational publications, but because they market the substances, they are subject to monitoring and enforcement by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), which polices claims by marketers. What constitutes the difference between truthful and false claims is hotly debated and is a central controversy in this arena.[citation needed]

Research by Sobh and Martin (2011) suggests that people buy anti-aging products to obtain a hoped-for self (e.g., keeping a youthful skin) or to avoid a feared-self (e.g., looking old). The research shows that when consumers pursue a hoped-for self, it is expectations of success that most strongly drive their motivation to use the product. The research also shows why doing badly when trying to avoid a feared self is more motivating than doing well. Interestingly, when product use is seen to fail it is more motivating than success when consumers seek to avoid a feared-self.[32]

The best-characterized anti-aging therapy was, and still is, CR. In some studies calorie restriction has been shown to extend the life of mice, yeast, and rhesus monkeys significantly.[33][34] However, a more recent study has shown that in contrast, calorie restriction has not improved the survival rate in rhesus monkeys.[35] Long-term human trials of CR are now being done. It is the hope of the anti-aging researchers that resveratrol, found in grapes, or pterostilbene, a more bio-available substance, found in blueberries, as well as rapamycin, a biotic substance discovered on Easter Island, may act as CR mimetics to increase the life span of humans.[36]

More recent work reveals that the effects long attributed to caloric restriction may be obtained by restriction of protein alone, and specifically of just the sulfur-containing amino acids cysteine and methionine.[37][38] Current research is into the metabolic pathways affected by variation in availability of products of these amino acids.

There are a number of chemicals intended to slow the aging process currently being studied in animal models.[39] One type of research is related to the observed effects a calorie restriction (CR) diet, which has been shown to extend lifespan in some animals[40] Based on that research, there have been attempts to develop drugs that will have the same effect on the aging process as a caloric restriction diet, which are known as Caloric restriction mimetic drugs. Some drugs that are already approved for other uses have been studied for possible longevity effects on laboratory animals because of a possible CR-mimic effect; they include rapamycin,[41]metformin and other geroprotectors.[42]MitoQ, Resveratrol and pterostilbene are dietary supplements that have also been studied in this context.[36][43][44]

Other attempts to create anti-aging drugs have taken different research paths. One notable direction of research has been research into the possibility of using the enzyme telomerase in order to counter the process of telomere shortening.[45] However, there are potential dangers in this, since some research has also linked telomerase to cancer and to tumor growth and formation.[46] In addition, some preparations, called senolytics are designed to effectively deplete senescent cells which poison an organism by their secretions.[47]

Future advances in nanomedicine could give rise to life extension through the repair of many processes thought to be responsible for aging. K. Eric Drexler, one of the founders of nanotechnology, postulated cell repair machines, including ones operating within cells and utilizing as yet hypothetical molecular computers, in his 1986 book Engines of Creation. Raymond Kurzweil, a futurist and transhumanist, stated in his book The Singularity Is Near that he believes that advanced medical nanorobotics could completely remedy the effects of aging by 2030.[48] According to Richard Feynman, it was his former graduate student and collaborator Albert Hibbs who originally suggested to him (circa 1959) the idea of a medical use for Feynman's theoretical micromachines (see nanotechnology). Hibbs suggested that certain repair machines might one day be reduced in size to the point that it would, in theory, be possible to (as Feynman put it) "swallow the doctor". The idea was incorporated into Feynman's 1959 essay There's Plenty of Room at the Bottom.[49]

Some life extensionists suggest that therapeutic cloning and stem cell research could one day provide a way to generate cells, body parts, or even entire bodies (generally referred to as reproductive cloning) that would be genetically identical to a prospective patient. Recently, the US Department of Defense initiated a program to research the possibility of growing human body parts on mice.[50] Complex biological structures, such as mammalian joints and limbs, have not yet been replicated. Dog and primate brain transplantation experiments were conducted in the mid-20th century but failed due to rejection and the inability to restore nerve connections. As of 2006, the implantation of bio-engineered bladders grown from patients' own cells has proven to be a viable treatment for bladder disease.[51] Proponents of body part replacement and cloning contend that the required biotechnologies are likely to appear earlier than other life-extension technologies.

The use of human stem cells, particularly embryonic stem cells, is controversial. Opponents' objections generally are based on interpretations of religious teachings or ethical considerations. Proponents of stem cell research point out that cells are routinely formed and destroyed in a variety of contexts. Use of stem cells taken from the umbilical cord or parts of the adult body may not provoke controversy.[52]

The controversies over cloning are similar, except general public opinion in most countries stands in opposition to reproductive cloning. Some proponents of therapeutic cloning predict the production of whole bodies, lacking consciousness, for eventual brain transplantation.

Replacement of biological (susceptible to diseases) organs with mechanical ones could extend life. This is the goal of 2045 Initiative.[53]

For cryonicists (advocates of cryopreservation), storing the body at low temperatures after death may provide an "ambulance" into a future in which advanced medical technologies may allow resuscitation and repair. They speculate cryogenic temperatures will minimize changes in biological tissue for many years, giving the medical community ample time to cure all disease, rejuvenate the aged and repair any damage that is caused by the cryopreservation process.

Many cryonicists do not believe that legal death is "real death" because stoppage of heartbeat and breathingthe usual medical criteria for legal deathoccur before biological death of cells and tissues of the body. Even at room temperature, cells may take hours to die and days to decompose. Although neurological damage occurs within 46 minutes of cardiac arrest, the irreversible neurodegenerative processes do not manifest for hours.[54] Cryonicists state that rapid cooling and cardio-pulmonary support applied immediately after certification of death can preserve cells and tissues for long-term preservation at cryogenic temperatures. People, particularly children, have survived up to an hour without heartbeat after submersion in ice water. In one case, full recovery was reported after 45 minutes underwater.[55] To facilitate rapid preservation of cells and tissue, cryonics "standby teams" are available to wait by the bedside of patients who are to be cryopreserved to apply cooling and cardio-pulmonary support as soon as possible after declaration of death.[56]

No mammal has been successfully cryopreserved and brought back to life, with the exception of frozen human embryos. Resuscitation of a postembryonic human from cryonics is not possible with current science. Some scientists still support the idea based on their expectations of the capabilities of future science.[57][58]

Another proposed life extension technology would combine existing and predicted future biochemical and genetic techniques. SENS proposes that rejuvenation may be obtained by removing aging damage via the use of stem cells and tissue engineering, telomere-lengthening machinery, allotopic expression of mitochondrial proteins, targeted ablation of cells, immunotherapeutic clearance, and novel lysosomal hydrolases.[59]

While many biogerontologists find these ideas "worthy of discussion"[60][61] and SENS conferences feature important research in the field,[62][63] some contend that the alleged benefits are too speculative given the current state of technology, referring to it as "fantasy rather than science".[3][5]

Gene therapy, in which nucleic acid polymers are delivered as a drug and are either expressed as proteins, interfere with the expression of proteins, or correct genetic mutations, has been proposed as a future strategy to prevent aging.[64][65]

A large array of genetic modifications have been found to increase lifespan in model organisms such as yeast, nematode worms, fruit flies, and mice. As of 2013, the longest extension of life caused by a single gene manipulation was roughly 150% in mice and 10-fold in nematode worms.[66]

In The Selfish Gene, Richard Dawkins describes an approach to life-extension that involves "fooling genes" into thinking the body is young.[67] Dawkins attributes inspiration for this idea to Peter Medawar. The basic idea is that our bodies are composed of genes that activate throughout our lifetimes, some when we are young and others when we are older. Presumably, these genes are activated by environmental factors, and the changes caused by these genes activating can be lethal. It is a statistical certainty that we possess more lethal genes that activate in later life than in early life. Therefore, to extend life, we should be able to prevent these genes from switching on, and we should be able to do so by "identifying changes in the internal chemical environment of a body that take place during aging... and by simulating the superficial chemical properties of a young body".[68]

According to some lines of thinking, the ageing process is routed into a basic reduction of biological complexity,[69] and thus loss of information. In order to reverse this loss, gerontologist Marios Kyriazis suggested that it is necessary to increase input of actionable and meaningful information both individually (into individual brains),[70] and collectively (into societal systems).[71] This technique enhances overall biological function through up-regulation of immune, hormonal, antioxidant and other parameters, resulting in improved age-repair mechanisms. Working in parallel with natural evolutionary mechanisms that can facilitate survival through increased fitness, Kryiazis claims that the technique may lead to a reduction of the rate of death as a function of age, i.e. indefinite lifespan.[72]

One hypothetical future strategy that, as some suggest, "eliminates" the complications related to a physical body, involves the copying or transferring (e.g. by progressively replacing neurons with transistors) of a conscious mind from a biological brain to a non-biological computer system or computational device. The basic idea is to scan the structure of a particular brain in detail, and then construct a software model of it that is so faithful to the original that, when run on appropriate hardware, it will behave in essentially the same way as the original brain.[73] Whether or not an exact copy of one's mind constitutes actual life extension is matter of debate.

The extension of life has been a desire of humanity and a mainstay motif in the history of scientific pursuits and ideas throughout history, from the Sumerian Epic of Gilgamesh and the Egyptian Smith medical papyrus, all the way through the Taoists, Ayurveda practitioners, alchemists, hygienists such as Luigi Cornaro, Johann Cohausen and Christoph Wilhelm Hufeland, and philosophers such as Francis Bacon, Ren Descartes, Benjamin Franklin and Nicolas Condorcet. However, the beginning of the modern period in this endeavor can be traced to the end of the 19th beginning of the 20th century, to the so-called fin-de-sicle (end of the century) period, denoted as an end of an epoch and characterized by the rise of scientific optimism and therapeutic activism, entailing the pursuit of life extension (or life-extensionism). Among the foremost researchers of life extension at this period were the Nobel Prize winning biologist Elie Metchnikoff (1845-1916) -- the author of the cell theory of immunity and vice director of Institut Pasteur in Paris, and Charles-douard Brown-Squard (1817-1894) -- the president of the French Biological Society and one of the founders of modern endocrinology.[74]

Sociologist James Hughes claims that science has been tied to a cultural narrative of conquering death since the Age of Enlightenment. He cites Francis Bacon (15611626) as an advocate of using science and reason to extend human life, noting Bacon's novel New Atlantis, wherein scientists worked toward delaying aging and prolonging life. Robert Boyle (16271691), founding member of the Royal Society, also hoped that science would make substantial progress with life extension, according to Hughes, and proposed such experiments as "to replace the blood of the old with the blood of the young". Biologist Alexis Carrel (18731944) was inspired by a belief in indefinite human lifespan that he developed after experimenting with cells, says Hughes.[75]

In 1970, the American Aging Association was formed under the impetus of Denham Harman, originator of the free radical theory of aging. Harman wanted an organization of biogerontologists that was devoted to research and to the sharing of information among scientists interested in extending human lifespan.

In 1976, futurists Joel Kurtzman and Philip Gordon wrote No More Dying. The Conquest Of Aging And The Extension Of Human Life, (ISBN 0-440-36247-4) the first popular book on research to extend human lifespan. Subsequently, Kurtzman was invited to testify before the House Select Committee on Aging, chaired by Claude Pepper of Florida, to discuss the impact of life extension on the Social Security system.

Saul Kent published The Life Extension Revolution (ISBN 0-688-03580-9) in 1980 and created a nutraceutical firm called the Life Extension Foundation, a non-profit organization that promotes dietary supplements. The Life Extension Foundation publishes a periodical called Life Extension Magazine. The 1982 bestselling book Life Extension: A Practical Scientific Approach (ISBN 0-446-51229-X) by Durk Pearson and Sandy Shaw further popularized the phrase "life extension".

In 1983, Roy Walford, a life-extensionist and gerontologist, published a popular book called Maximum Lifespan. In 1988, Walford and his student Richard Weindruch summarized their research into the ability of calorie restriction to extend the lifespan of rodents in The Retardation of Aging and Disease by Dietary Restriction (ISBN 0-398-05496-7). It had been known since the work of Clive McCay in the 1930s that calorie restriction can extend the maximum lifespan of rodents. But it was the work of Walford and Weindruch that gave detailed scientific grounding to that knowledge.[citation needed] Walford's personal interest in life extension motivated his scientific work and he practiced calorie restriction himself. Walford died at the age of 80 from complications caused by amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.

Money generated by the non-profit Life Extension Foundation allowed Saul Kent to finance the Alcor Life Extension Foundation, the world's largest cryonics organization. The cryonics movement had been launched in 1962 by Robert Ettinger's book, The Prospect of Immortality. In the 1960s, Saul Kent had been a co-founder of the Cryonics Society of New York. Alcor gained national prominence when baseball star Ted Williams was cryonically preserved by Alcor in 2002 and a family dispute arose as to whether Williams had really wanted to be cryopreserved.

Regulatory and legal struggles between the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Life Extension Foundation included seizure of merchandise and court action. In 1991, Saul Kent and Bill Faloon, the principals of the Foundation, were jailed. The LEF accused the FDA of perpetrating a "Holocaust" and "seeking gestapo-like power" through its regulation of drugs and marketing claims.[76]

In 2003, Doubleday published "The Immortal Cell: One Scientist's Quest to Solve the Mystery of Human Aging," by Michael D. West. West emphasised the potential role of embryonic stem cells in life extension.[77]

Other modern life extensionists include writer Gennady Stolyarov, who insists that death is "the enemy of us all, to be fought with medicine, science, and technology";[78]transhumanist philosopher Zoltan Istvan, who proposes that the "transhumanist must safeguard one's own existence above all else";[79] futurist George Dvorsky, who considers aging to be a problem that desperately needs to be solved;[80] and recording artist Steve Aoki, who has been called "one of the most prolific campaigners for life extension".[81]

In 1991, the American Academy of Anti-Aging Medicine (A4M) was formed as a non-profit organization to create what it considered an anti-aging medical specialty distinct from geriatrics, and to hold trade shows for physicians interested in anti-aging medicine. The A4M trains doctors in anti-aging medicine and publicly promotes the field of anti-aging research. It has about 26,000 members, of whom about 97% are doctors and scientists.[82] The American Board of Medical Specialties recognizes neither anti-aging medicine nor the A4M's professional standing.[83]

In 2003, Aubrey de Grey and David Gobel formed the Methuselah Foundation, which gives financial grants to anti-aging research projects. In 2009, de Grey and several others founded the SENS Research Foundation, a California-based scientific research organization which conducts research into aging and funds other anti-aging research projects at various universities.[84] In 2013, Google announced Calico, a new company based in San Francisco that will harness new technologies to increase scientific understanding of the biology of aging.[85] It is led by Arthur D. Levinson,[86] and its research team includes scientists such as Hal V. Barron, David Botstein, and Cynthia Kenyon. In 2014, biologist Craig Venter founded Human Longevity Inc., a company dedicated to scientific research to end aging through genomics and cell therapy. They received funding with the goal of compiling a comprehensive human genotype, microbiome, and phenotype database.[87]

Aside from private initiatives, aging research is being conducted in university laboratories, and includes universities such as Harvard and UCLA. University researchers have made a number of breakthroughs in extending the lives of mice and insects by reversing certain aspects of aging.[88][89][90][91]

Though many scientists state[92] that life extension and radical life extension are possible, there are still no international or national programs focused on radical life extension. There are political forces staying for and against life extension. By 2012, in Russia, the United States, Israel, and the Netherlands, the Longevity political parties started. They aimed to provide political support to radical life extension research and technologies, and ensure the fastest possible and at the same time soft transition of society to the next step life without aging and with radical life extension, and to provide access to such technologies to most currently living people.[93]

Leon Kass (chairman of the US President's Council on Bioethics from 2001 to 2005) has questioned whether potential exacerbation of overpopulation problems would make life extension unethical.[94] He states his opposition to life extension with the words:

"simply to covet a prolonged life span for ourselves is both a sign and a cause of our failure to open ourselves to procreation and to any higher purpose ... [The] desire to prolong youthfulness is not only a childish desire to eat one's life and keep it; it is also an expression of a childish and narcissistic wish incompatible with devotion to posterity."[95]

John Harris, former editor-in-chief of the Journal of Medical Ethics, argues that as long as life is worth living, according to the person himself, we have a powerful moral imperative to save the life and thus to develop and offer life extension therapies to those who want them.[96]

Transhumanist philosopher Nick Bostrom has argued that any technological advances in life extension must be equitably distributed and not restricted to a privileged few.[97] In an extended metaphor entitled "The Fable of the Dragon-Tyrant", Bostrom envisions death as a monstrous dragon who demands human sacrifices. In the fable, after a lengthy debate between those who believe the dragon is a fact of life and those who believe the dragon can and should be destroyed, the dragon is finally killed. Bostrom argues that political inaction allowed many preventable human deaths to occur.[98]

Life extension is a controversial topic due to fear of overpopulation and possible effects on society.[99] Biogerontologist Aubrey De Grey counters the overpopulation critique by pointing out that the therapy could postpone or eliminate menopause, allowing women to space out their pregnancies over more years and thus decreasing the yearly population growth rate.[100] Moreover, the philosopher and futurist Max More argues that, given the fact the worldwide population growth rate is slowing down and is projected to eventually stabilize and begin falling, superlongevity would be unlikely to contribute to overpopulation.[99]

A Spring 2013 Pew Research poll in the United States found that 38% of Americans would want life extension treatments, and 56% would reject it. However, it also found that 68% believed most people would want it and that only 4% consider an "ideal lifespan" to be more than 120 years. The median "ideal lifespan" was 91 years of age and the majority of the public (63%) viewed medical advances aimed at prolonging life as generally good. 41% of Americans believed that radical life extension (RLE) would be good for society, while 51% said they believed it would be bad for society.[101] One possibility for why 56% of Americans claim they would reject life extension treatments may be due to the cultural perception that living longer would result in a longer period of decrepitude, and that the elderly in our current society are unhealthy.[102]

Religious people are no more likely to oppose life extension than the unaffiliated,[101] though some variation exists between religious denominations.

Most mainstream medical organizations and practitioners do not consider aging to be a disease. David Sinclair says: "Idon't see aging as a disease, but as a collection of quite predictable diseases caused by the deterioration of the body".[103] The two main arguments used are that aging is both inevitable and universal while diseases are not.[104] However, not everyone agrees. Harry R. Moody, Director of Academic Affairs for AARP, notes that what is normal and what is disease strongly depends on a historical context.[105] David Gems, Assistant Director of the Institute of Healthy Ageing, strongly argues that aging should be viewed as a disease.[106] In response to the universality of aging, David Gems notes that it is as misleading as arguing that Basenji are not dogs because they do not bark.[107] Because of the universality of aging he calls it a 'special sort of disease'. Robert M. Perlman, coined the terms aging syndrome and disease complex in 1954 to describe aging.[108]

The discussion whether aging should be viewed as a disease or not has important implications. It would stimulate pharmaceutical companies to develop life extension therapies and in the United States of America, it would also increase the regulation of the anti-aging market by the FDA. Anti-aging now falls under the regulations for cosmetic medicine which are less tight than those for drugs.[107][109]

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Life extension - Wikipedia

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The Life Extension Foundation was the first organization to defy the FDA by promoting the use of antioxidant vitamins to maintain health.

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Magnesium 500 mg 100 Capsules $12.00 $9.00

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Mix 315 Tablets $80.00 $60.00

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Life Extension - Page 1 - Health Food Emporium

The directory of Innovative Doctors and Health Practitioners is a worldwide listing of anti-aging doctors and other medical professionals who practice or have expressed interest in all aspects of preventive medicine (such as heart attack and stroke prevention), hormone replacement therapy, nutrition and dietary supplements, and other areas of alternative and complementary medicine. Invariably, they welcome individuals who choose to be involved in their own health care.

Provided to you by Extension, the directory of Innovative Doctors and Health Practitioners facilitates the location of anti-aging doctors and health practitioners who are open to alternatives to allopathic medicine. Conveniently organized geographically, the listing can be used to find a doctor by areaa handy feature for those who are traveling or are simply seeking out anti-aging doctors or health practitioners at home. The directory of Innovative Doctors and Health Practitioners is especially useful for those on a life extension program that includes the use of dietary supplements and hormones, as the listed physicians and health practitioners would likely be more suited to evaluate such a program than more conventional doctors.

While prevention, nutrition and longevity are important to the physicians and health practitioners listed, each of them has their own approach to health and wellness. So be sure to clarify the reason for your visit, as well as your goals in seeking out such treatment when scheduling your appointment.

ALABAMA ALASKA AMERICAN SAMOA ARIZONA ARKANSAS ARMED FORCES AMERICAS ARMED FORCES EUROPE ARMED FORCES PACIFIC CALIFORNIA COLORADO CONNECTICUT DELAWARE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA FLORIDA GEORGIA GUAM HAWAII IDAHO ILLINOIS INDIANA IOWA KANSAS KENTUCKY LOUISIANA MAINE MARSHALL ISLANDS MARYLAND MASSACHUSETTS MICHIGAN MICRONESIA FED STATES MINNESOTA MISSISSIPPI MISSOURI MONTANA NEBRASKA NEVADA NEW HAMPSHIRE NEW JERSEY NEW MEXICO NEW SOUTH WALES NEW YORK NORTH CAROLINA NORTH DAKOTA NORTHERN MARIANA ISLANDS OHIO OKLAHOMA OREGON PALAU PENNSYLVANIA PLEASE SELECT PUERTO RICO RHODE ISLAND SOUTH AUSTRALIA SOUTH CAROLINA SOUTH DAKOTA TASMANIA TENNESSEE TEXAS UTAH VERMONT VICTORIA VIRGIN ISLANDS VIRGINIA WASHINGTON WEST VIRGINIA WISCONSIN WYOMING

DISCLAIMER: Inclusion in the directory of Innovative Doctors and Health and Wellness Practitioners does not constitute endorsement by Life Extension, nor are these physicians or other health practitioners affiliated with Life Extension. All physicians and health practitioners who appear on this list do so on the sole basis of their own expression of interest in the fields of health and wellness, longevity, or preventive medicine. Life Extension has not verified the competence, professional credentials, business practices or validity of the expressed interests of these physicians and health practitioners. Life Extension makes no recommendation of any physician or health practitioner on this list and makes no suggestion that any such physician or health practitioner will cure or prevent any disease, reduce anyone's rate of aging or extend anyone's life. Those consulting a physician or other health practitioner on this list should approach the consultation exactly as they would with any other unknown physician or health practitioner. Listings are periodically updated. However, physicians and health practitioners are not obligated to notify Life Extension should they relocate or retire. Life Extension relies in great part on feedback, which determines the continued eligibility of the physicians and health practitioners listed. Please contact Life Extension if you have any comments concerning any of the physicians or other health practitioners on this list.

Excerpt from:

Directory of Innovative Anti-Aging Doctors, Health And ...

Supplement your knowledge on anti-aging and optimal health

The Life Extension Foundation Buyers Club is an organization whose long-range goal is the extension of the healthy human life span. In seeking to control aging, our objective is to develop methods to enable us to live in vigor, health and wellness for an unlimited period of time. Life Extension was established in the early 1980s, but its founders have been involved in the anti-aging field since the 1960s. Life Extension publishes the very latest information on anti-aging and wellness in its monthly publication, Life Extension Magazine, the Disease Prevention and Treatment book of integrative health protocols, the Life Extension Update e-mail newsletter and the Daily Health Bulletin, and at this website. All to support more informed health choices.

With more potent, more complete vitamin and supplement formations

In addition to a wealth of information, Life Extension offers 300+ premium-quality vitamins, minerals, hormones, diet and nutritional supplements, and even skin care products, which are often the fruits of research reported on or funded by the Life Extension.

The Life Extension Foundation is one of the worlds largest membership organizations dedicated to investigating every method of extending the healthy human life span and funding anti-aging research. When seeking methods to slow aging, the non-profit Life Extension Foundation often uncovers potential therapies to fight the conditions associated with aging.

Based on current scientific research, Life Extension is continually formulating and upgrading its science-based multivitamin, vitamin, and nutritional supplement formulas to include the latest novel ingredients that are years ahead of mainstream offerings. As such, Life Extension has originated such innovative supplements as Life Extension Mix, a multivitamin that incorporates many recent research findings in health and nutrition.

Life Extensions stringent approach to quality assurance and 100% Satisfaction Guarantee make its supplements the gold standard of the industry.

As part of a total health and nutrition program

What began as a newsletter over 30 years ago has evolved into a total health offering, including:

Learn how you can access all of the above services, as well as receive discounts on dietary supplements and blood testing, by joining the Life Extension Foundation.

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About Us - Life Extension