Aging and Life Extension – [INFOgraphic]

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An infographic look at aging.

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Growing demand for “enhanced cosmetics” is fostering research on micro-capsules and other technology to package those ingredients in creams, lotions and other products to take advantage of a global market valued at $425 billion in 2011. To meet that demand, chemical companies are looking for better ways to encapsulate these additives — which can reduce inflammation, repair hair or prevent wrinkles — to stop them from breaking down in the bottle or help deliver them to the skin and hair more effectively. (via Enhanced cosmetics | KurzweilAI)

Here’s a pretty good kickstart for a science resume; inventing a disease-fighting, anti-aging compound using nano-particles from trees at age 16. Janelle Tam took top honors at the 2012 Sanofi BioGENEius Challenge Canada. Her super anti-oxidant compound could one day help improve health and anti-aging products by neutralizing harmful free-radicals found in the body. Tam, a Grade 12 student at Waterloo Collegiate Institute, was awarded the $5,000 first prize by Canadian scientists assembled at the Ottawa headquarters of the National Research Council of Canada. Her competition was 13 students in Grades 11 or 12, who were top prize winners of nine regional SBCC competitions conducted nationwide in March and April. The theme of the competition, “How will you change the world?” inspired hundreds of students to participate in 2012 SBCC events Canada-wide.

Teenager Invents Anti-Aging, Disease-Fighting Compound Using Tree Nanoparticles

Scientists stop the ageing process (ABC News in Science)

Clean bill of health: Scientists have shown that clearing damaged protein from the liver helps stop age decline in the organ (Source: iStockphoto)

Scientists have stopped the ageing process in an entire organ for the first time, a study released today says.

Published in today’s online edition of Nature Medicine, researchers at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine at Yeshiva University in New York City also say the older organs function as well as they did when the host animal was younger.

The researchers, led by Associate Professor Ana Maria Cuervo, blocked the ageing process in mice livers by stopping the build-up of harmful proteins inside the organ’s cells.

As people age their cells become less efficient at getting rid of damaged protein resulting in a build-up of toxic material that is especially pronounced in Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and other neurodegenerative disorders.

The researchers say the findings suggest that therapies for boosting protein clearance might help stave off some of the declines in function that accompanies old age.

In experiments, livers in genetically modified mice 22 to 26 months old, the equivalent of octogenarians in human years, cleaned blood as efficiently as those in animals a quarter their age.

By contrast, the livers of normal mice in a control group began to fail.

The benefits of restoring the cleaning mechanisms found inside all cells could extend far beyond a single organ, says Cuervo.

“Our findings are particularly relevant for neurodegenerative disorders such as Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s,” she says.

Read on…

via Scientists stop the ageing process (ABC News in Science).

The Scientist : The Longevity Dividend

• The Scientist : The Longevity Dividend
  

   

  • Imagine an intervention, such as a pill, that could significantly reduce your risk of cancer. Imagine an intervention that could reduce your risk of stroke, or dementia, or arthritis. Now, imagine an intervention that does all these things, and at the same time reduces your risk of everything else undesirable about growing older: including heart disease, diabetes, Alzheimer and Parkinson disease, hip fractures, osteoporosis, sensory impairments, and sexual dysfunction. Such a pill may sound like fantasy, but aging interventions already do this in animal models. And many scientists believe that such an intervention is a realistically achievable goal for people. People already place a high value on both quality and length of life, which is why children are immunized against infectious diseases. In the same spirit, we suggest that a concerted effort to slow aging begin immediately – because it will save and extend lives, improve health, and create wealth.
  • The experience of aging is about to change. Humans are approaching old age in unprecedented numbers, and this generation and all that follow have the potential to live longer, healthier lives than any in history. These changing demographics also carry the prospect of overwhelming increases in age-related disease, frailty, disability, and all the associated costs and social burdens. The choices we make now will have a profound influence on the health and the wealth of current and future generations.
  • THE TARGET

    What we have in mind is not the unrealistic pursuit of dramatic increases in life expectancy, let alone the kind of biological immortality best left to science fiction novels.Rather, we envision a goal that is realistically achievable: a modest deceleration in the rate of aging sufficient to delay all aging-related diseases and disorders by about seven years.This target was chosen because the risk of death and most other negative attributes of aging tends to rise exponentially throughout the adult lifespan with a doubling time of approximately seven years.Such a delay would yield health and longevity benefits greater than what would be achieved with the elimination of cancer or heart disease.And we believe it can be achieved for generations now alive.

They’re Putting Anti-Aging Enzymes in the Water

Anti-aging, longevity, vitality, regeneration, its all the rage! it appears that the nanotech and biotech industries are on the verge of changing our lifespans. The question remains, how many of us are ready for the longevity revolution? and make no mistake, a revolution it is.

clipped from io9.com Within about 10 years, you might be drinking anti-aging enzymes with your bottled water. California biochemists have a plan to keep the world younger and healthier by using nanotech to deliver an enzyme called CoQ10 to our drinking water. This coenzyme is naturally produced by the body, but in smaller and smaller amounts as we age. And yet it’s vital for the body’s basic functioning, as it helps our cells convert sugars to energy. Perhaps if we boost its presence in our bodies as we age, our organs will remain productive and healthy for much longer. Chemists like UC Santa Barbara’s Bruce Lipshutz, who studies CoQ10, hope that in the future we will also accept the idea that CoQ10 comes in drinking water, perhaps along with several other vital vitamins and enzymes. So even if you want to grow old and die in the old-fashioned way, you may not be able to — at least, if you plan to drink water. Nanotechnology Adds Vital Enzyme to Drinking Water [via ZDNet]