衰老——科学大家仍在犯晕

 今天收到Carnes教授来信，询问我对当今《细胞》主编理查德·米勒的文章——“基因对抗衰老”——的意见（见附件 Miller-JGBSi-2012.pdf）。初读一过发现不少科学大佬对于衰老问题还在犯晕，在此贴出，给大家透一点消息，看看衰老研究的复杂现状，也听听大家的意见。

Carnes教授来信如下：——————————————

问候大中:

理查德·米勒是或曾经是《细胞》的主编。我最近读到他的文章——“基因对抗衰老”——。他在文章中提出了一些有用的问题。但在我看来,许多老年医学专家仍然在衰老和长寿的问题上混淆不清。

“寿命决定”确实有大量的基因参与。长寿确实意味着更长时间的意外损伤来”积累不可挽回的损害”。

另外我也相信,一个混淆人类使用的时钟时间和生物时间的关键在物种差别。

这是一个重要的时间，在老年医学与人口统计学家宣称，到本世纪中叶将实现由一个源自于新的抗衰老技术的“长寿红利”，使得人类平均寿命将达到100岁。这个论点已经被重复提出很多次,而且还将继续被提出，最终聚集在那“修改衰老”的焦点上。这是一个非常艰巨的任务,如果可能的话。

无论如何, 发给您两个文件，对您的看法很感兴趣。

布鲁斯·A·Carnes博士

俄克拉荷马大学健康科学中心

雷诺兹老年医学部

俄克拉荷马城, 俄克拉荷马州 

电话: (405)271 - 8001(分机30460)

网页: http://www.ouhsc.edu/geriatricmedicine/carnes_web/index.html

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Carnes博士的原文如下：

Greeting Dazhong:

 Rich Miller is or was the chief editor of Cell. I came across his attached paper - "Genes Against Aging" - recently. He raises useful questions but it still seems to me that many gerontologists confuse aging and longevity.

 Longevity has a significant amount of genetic involvement. Living longer does provide more time for the unintended "accumulation of irreparable damage".

 There is also, I believe, a confusion between the clock time humans use to measure time and biological time which measures the pace of biological (developmental) milestones within species.

 This is an important time in gerontology with demographers declaring that human life expectancy will reach 100 by the middle of this century achieved in part by a "longevity dividend" arising from new anti-aging technologies. This cycle has been repeated many times and will continue to do so as the reality eventually sets in that modifying aging is an exceedingly difficult task, if possible at all.

 Anyway, would be interested in your reactions to the two documents.

 Bruce

Bruce A. Carnes, Ph.D.

University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center

Reynolds Department of Geriatric Medicine

Oklahoma City, OK