Current theories of biological aging
- 1 January 1975
- book chapter
- review article
- Published by Springer Science and Business Media LLC
- Vol. 34 (1), 11-19
- https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4684-2631-1_3
Abstract
Several lines of evidence have led to the notion that biological aging occurs as a result of changes in information-containing molecules either at the genetic or epigenetic level. The error theory, the redundant message theory, the codon restriction theory, and the transcriptional event theory represent the major current conceptualizations of biological aging as held by most gerontologists. The finding that cultured normal human and animal cells undergo a finite number of population doublings in vitro has provided new insights into age changes at the cellular level. The number of mitotic events that cultured normal animal cells can undergo appears to be inversely related to the age of the donor. A direct proportionality exists, however, between the mean maximum life-span of a species and the number of population doublings that their cultured embryonic cells will undergo. The several biochemical decrements known to occur prior to the cessation of mitotic activity in vitro are thought to herald those manifestations of senescence seen in the whole animal. Yet to be explained is how those cell classes such as the germ plasm and continuously propagable cancer cells escape from the inevitability of biological aging.—Hayflick, L. Current theories of biological aging. Federation Proc. 34: 9–13, 1975. Keywords Biological Aging Current Theory Population Doubling Error Theory Germ Plasm These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.Keywords
This publication has 27 references indexed in Scilit:
- The Strategy of SenescenceThe Gerontologist, 1974
- The biology of human agingThe American Journal of the Medical Sciences, 1973
- Repetition of molecular-genetic information as a possible factor in evolutionary changes of life spanExperimental Gerontology, 1972
- Codon-restriction theory of aging and developmentJournal of Theoretical Biology, 1971
- Aging under glassExperimental Gerontology, 1970
- Mistranslation and Ageing in NeurosporaNature, 1970
- Physiology, Homoeostasis and AgeingGerontology, 1968
- Lymphocyte Content and Proliferative Capacity of Serially Transplanted Mouse Bone MarrowNature, 1964
- Review Lectures on Senescence - II. Heterochronic transplantation in the study of ageingProceedings of the Royal Society of London. B. Biological Sciences, 1962
- Origin and Comparison of the Effects of Time and High-Energy Radiations on Living SystemsThe Quarterly Review of Biology, 1959