How Silicon Valley is trying to cure ageing

The prize will be awarded to the first team to unlock what many believe to be the secret to ageing: homeostatic capacity, or the ability of the body's systems to stabilise in response to stressors.

As the body ages, being able to recover from diseases, injuries and lifestyle stresses becomes more difficult. In youth, blood pressure and elevated blood sugar levels can return easily to normal levels.

As homeostatic capacity erodes as we get older, the body is no longer able to regulate these changes as effectively, resulting in diseases such as diabetes or hypertension.

Dr Yun, who worked for several years as a radiologist at Stanford Hospital before joining a hedge fund investing in health care, uses the analogy of a "weeble wobble" toy to explain that no matter how far it is pushed, it is able to centre itself again.

A person only becomes aware of their body's homeostasis when they start losing it in middle age: often characterised by the loss of ability to tolerate cold or hot weather, or feeling nauseous after a roller-coaster ride where you once felt exhilarated.

"Up until about 45 years old, most people die from external stressors such as trauma or infection, but as we get older we die of what looks like a loss of intrinsic capacities," he tells The Sunday Telegraph.

Increased homeostatic capacity could allow people to live beyond 120 years the theoretical maximum human lifespan.

Scientists could effectively slow down the body's clock and enable us to remain middle aged for 50 years or more, meaning we can feel 50 when we are really 80. The future could see us not just living longer, but staying healthier for longer.

"This isn't like plastic surgery where you're papering over the cracks, this is actually making a person younger from the inside out," Dr Yun says.

The first half of the prize will be awarded next year to the team that can restore the homeostatic capacity of an ageing adult mammal to that of a young one, thereby reversing the effects of ageing.

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How Silicon Valley is trying to cure ageing