http://www.betterhumans.com/News/news.aspx?articleID=2003-06-13-3

Aging Researchers Find Evidence for Self-destruct Signal

Dwayne Hunter

Betterhumans Staff

Friday, June 13, 2003, 1:50:26 PM CT

Combining the circulatory systems of old and young mice has provided evidence that aging begins when the body receives a command to self-destruct.

Researchers who study life extension are interested in the causes of senescence.

"Some believe that this is a natural process, caused by accumulation of wastes of vital functions and by insult to cells due to environmental influence. Others assume that self-repairing and self-purification capabilities of a human organism are quite high and are far from exhausted within the 85 years assigned for a life of an individual," says Gennady Boutenko, a member of the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences. "It means that at some point, a command is turned on to slow down the recovery process, and this is when the old age begins."

To test this theory, gerontologists from Kiev, under Boutenko's guidance, conducted a study presented at a workshop called "Fundamental Problems of Senescence" that was held this May at the Kiev Institute of Gerontology.

Working from a theory that the blood of the old contains something that triggers aging, the researchers combined the circulatory systems of young and old mice to achieve parabiosis, the natural or surgical union of two animals in such a way that there is an exchange of blood.

Their intention was to determine if the hypothetical aging trigger could be transferred from the old mouse to the young mouse to spark immediate aging, thus supporting the aging-signal hypothesis.

This is exactly what happened.

Unknown trigger

Before the exchange of blood, the young mouse's ovaries contained follicles in abundance. After the exchange of blood, the follicles deformed and the ovaries appeared similar to those of the older animal.

Boutenko says that American researchers, Czech researchers and Japanese researchers have carried out similar experiments with similar results.

Researchers originally thought that the aging-signal was a hormone being transferred from the old organism to the young. However, because hormones only live for a few minutes, the explanation was thrown out because the mixing rate of the blood was 1% per minute and only half the animals' blood was exchanged within 140 minutes.

The researchers conclude that there is some unknown factor in the old animal's blood that triggers the aging process, likely by blocking the action or triggering the action of genes.

"All that closely resembles the embryonic growth program, where new mechanisms get switched on at certain stages and the organism goes through some point of no return," says Boutenko.

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