Pathophysiology Of Ageing

At the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI) they conducted a study on age-related cell damage

It is a known fact that all measures of physiological function decline in human aging. While genetics certainly play a role in the declining of physiological function with age, it can be argued that a fundamental part of aging can be reflected by chemical processes resulting in the appearance of harmful side products of the normal metabolism over time. When enzymes speed up reactions it is harder to slow them down. At the same time side reactions are constantly occurring and more and more unwanted side products are continuously being formed.

The neurological deficits of aging may be viewed from a developmental perspective. That is, the decline in functional efficiency and deterioration of highly specialized non-dividing neuronal cells is the end point of a maturation process that occurs throughout adult life. Involution to senescence is a normal, inevitable, and inexorable physiological march; the end phase of which is expressed in generally predictable and specifically unpredictable ways. The earliest of these developmental changes occurs long before senescence and the effects of these physiological events quietly accumulate toward expression late in life.

However, cancer cells use an enzyme called telomerase that adds more telomeres to cells so that the cancerous cells can multiply for a much longer amount of time. The Hayflick limit shortens our life spans but we have it so that we can live for a few decades or so more than we could without it. Dr. Moalem says that this programmed aging benefits humans by allowing us to evolve more quickly and making sure that any infected humans don’t infect the next generation. This reading modified my view on diseases and inheritance because I never thought that aging could be something that you evolve into. Death has a way of making itself feel prominent everywhere you go, so imagining a world where organisms were just evolving into this modern reality is difficult. I found it interesting that aging is an advantage even though it feels like a disadvantage to many. Dr. Moalem mentioned, “...the same researchers who first linked progeria-relating aging to normal aging also demonstrated that it is possible to reverse the cellular damage caused by progeria.” If more people spent time researching this and worked together, they could possibly reverse aging in people as

Cellular senescence has always previously thought to be an unavoidable and irreversible process wherein old cells stop dividing and undergo a series of chemical and physical changes. These bigger, flatter senescent cells do not die and accumulate in all parts of the body. Senescent cells were only associated with a body’s natural safeguard against cancer; Cells that are cancerous are often fast-tracked to senescence in hopes that it will stop dividing further. However, recent discoveries have shown that senescent cells actually pump out a variety of proteins that cause inflammation, a normally healthy immune response that damages healthy cells in the long run. Almost every discovered

A positive note, over time the health status of our aging population has shown some improvements, this could be linked to the lower disease burden of recent generations. More seasoned individuals can live fiery and dynamic lives until a later age than in the past and on the off-chance that they’re encouraged to be profitable; they can be contributors as well. Additionally the likelihood of current intensive biomedical anti-aging studies should not be left out; they may increase the healthy and productive time of human life in years to

During each and every cell replication, chromosomes shrink by a small, but noticeable amount. Because of this, telomeres cap the ends to protect the coding regions of the chromosomes. With each generation of DNA, more and more of the telomere disappears. An enzyme slowly rebuilds them, but it cannot keep up with the degradation during chromosome replication. Eventually the shortened telomeres cause the cell to go through apoptosis (Pierce 2014). Because telomeres are one cause of cell death, it is hypothesized that telomere size can determine the health and age of an individual. Research has shown a correlation between telomere length and chronic disease. Those with chronic diseases usually have significantly shorter telomeres. This raises

Aging is actually the slowing process of cells: using less and less energy or entropy. As we age, our cells don’t regenerate as quickly as they used to. We slow down, our internal systems slow down and we just don’t generate the heat and energy of before. Entropy will envelope our closed system (cell) and it will just not produce as it should.

Now we know that progeria is a genetic mutation that causes what seems like accelerated ageing but what exactly is ageing? And what causes it? Well no one knows for sure but one idea is linked to Progeria. Progeria is caused by a mutation in Lamina A (you will learn more about this in the next paragraph) which misshapes the cells nuclei and causes stem cells to be unable to replace the old, worn, cells leading to deterioration over time (Travis, J. (2003). An easier way to understand this is shown through the words of Shaoni Bhattacharya in her essay The children who grow old before they grow up whenever she states “The gene encodes lamin A, a protein found in a cell's nucleus. This is a major part of the lamina, a kind of scaffolding on the inner side of the nuclear envelope. It is also associated with DNA itself. There is still a lot to discover about

When scientists killed off a certain kind of cell that accumulates in the body with age mice were much healthier and lived about 25 percent longer. The mice didn't seem to suffer any ill effects from losing their so-called senescent cells,these are cells that have stopped dividing, they were though not necessarily because the cells themselves are old. "It's a normal cell that experienced an unusual amount of stress, and it decided to stop dividing," says Jan van Deursen, who studies senescent cells at the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine in Rochester,

Human beings are known to deteriorate naturally with age in a process called aging, which is a psychological change in the human body leading to senescence. When human beings age, the biological functions of their bodies, resistance to diseases, and their ability to adapt to stress declines (Aldwin & Gilmer, 2013). The causes of aging have remained uncertain for a long time, and the process of aging has remained a biological puzzle. Nevertheless, scientific researchers that have set their sights on explaining the causes of aging have attributed the primary causes of aging to both programmed factors and damage-related factors.

While biologists in the field of aging, known as biogerontologists, work earnestly to understand and investigate the fundamental biology of aging, there are anti-aging entrepreneurs capitalizing on vulnerable populations with false promises of longevity and the fountain of youth. In an attempt to educate the public, and differentiate the pseudoscientists from the legitimate biologists, three scientists published an article stating there was no marketed intervention that could slow, stop, or reverse the aging process, and cautioned that some products may even be dangerous (Binstock, 2003). An international roster of 51 physicians and scientists endorsed these biogerontologists in a position statement expressing the biological research that has been done, and the lack of interventions currently available to slow the progression of aging. The position statement was published in several scientific journals and a summarized version of this statement was published in the AARP bulletin,

Telomeres are directly correlated to the aging of a human body. Although some people might think that shorter telomere lengths are detrimental, the natural shortening of these telomeres are essential to healthy and normal aging. It is natural for cells to divide through mitosis, but each time cells are split telomeres are lost through the process. This is why the telomere maintenance system was evolved to protect the ends of chromosomes (Prescott, Kraft, & Chasman, 2011). Every time a cell is divided, its telomeres are weakened, and stress can accelerate this weakening, and biologically age the person. As a

Aging is the process of becoming older, as we age, multiple mutations occur that concern all the processes of aging well as it compromising a number of different genes. There are many theories of biological aging, such as the Cellular Aging Theory, Immunological Theory, and the Wear and Tear Theory. The Cellular Aging theory describes the process of aging in which cells slow their number of replication, thus giving each species a “biological clock that determines its maximum life span” and how quickly one 's health will deteriorate(Hooyman, 42). After a certain number of years, each cell which follows an apparent biological clock starts to replicate itself less, thus the specific individual or species slowly deteriorates. This theory gives

Also spelled as ageing, this is generally the process of becoming old. It is the in a way the opposite of immortality. In a broader aspect, it may occur to single cells in an organism also called cellular senescence or the population of a species, known as population ageing. This process primarily affects human beings and fungi. In humans, it signifies the accumulation of various changes which occur over time. The changes include physical, social and psychological changes.