Jellyfish Evolves Immortality
NURPAX / FLICKR
Researchers have documented the first immortal animal, a jellyfish species called Turritopsis nutricula. The species has been seen to reverse its aging and revert to its its earlier polyp stage, periodically restarting its lifecycle. The rejuvenation relies on transdifferation, the transformation of one mature (non-stem, or “differentiated”) cell type into another. All evidence suggests that Turritopsis can repeat this process indefinitely, meaning that it will never die as a consequence of aging, ever. Researchers suggested that studying the Turritopsis could lead to breakthroughs in reversing the human aging process.
“Senescence” is the scientific term for aging, and the cellular degradation that accompanies it. Most biologists attribute senescence in humans and other animals to “telomeres”, which are tiny caps on the ends of each chromosome. Telomeres protect DNA from being corrupted, but during every repetition of the cell cycle, they become incrementally shorter. Eventually the telomeres become so short that cells cannot divide at all, a point known as the Hayflick Limit.
The term “negligible senescence” describes organisms that do not show signs of age related degradation, and includes animals such as the sturgeon, lobster and giant tortoise.
With the goal of emulating such natural longevity, English transhumanist Aubrey De Grey founded the S.E.N.S, or “Strategies for Engineered Negligible Senescence” in 2002 to research medical strategies for elongating the human lifespan. You may be able to guess that they haven’t quite got it down yet.
Posted in TechnoLogical
April 2nd, 2010 at 10:19 am
fascinating topic, i never seen one thing about this before
April 5th, 2010 at 12:17 pm
Awesome article!!!
April 15th, 2010 at 8:17 am
I hope that scientists would get more information from that study that’ll help them develop medicine for sustaining a long life or perhaps being immortal like those jellies.
August 23rd, 2010 at 9:09 pm
That is awesome. I am currently working on an article about Daoist meditators in China who have believed for thousands of years (in their teachings) that it is possible to transform the body via the mind so it can become immortal. And it’s in a similar way to this, in that it involves a ‘different kind’ of cellular reproduction than normal people naturally possess.
August 23rd, 2010 at 11:38 pm
Amazing, too bad we can’t fuse those genes with humans.
August 23rd, 2010 at 11:59 pm
That’s pretty cool. But I’d never want to be immortal. Life isn’t that great. The average 80 years is already pushing it. I think we were better off when the average mortality rate was 60 years. Medical advances to keep people alive have done nothing but increase the world’s population exponentially to an unsustainable degree. Thank God we have cancer and HIV for population control lol
August 28th, 2010 at 1:57 pm
just knowing this bit of information is going to lead to something that destroys us, especially if we find someway to adapt this to human genetics. The benefits as usual will be short lived, and someone will find a way to abuse it. I hope that for once mankind realizes that something are better left untouched, but that’s wishful thinking.
August 28th, 2010 at 9:04 pm
I used to think that I wouldn’t want to be immortal, but as I grow older, I want immortality. Of course, I wouldn’t want to be immortal and live as a shriveled old man, but if I could keep youth and vigor, I would love to live forever. Personally, I think that the next step in human evolution would be more a technological one than a biological one, though. I think that it would be far easier to find a way to combine with machines to live forever than it would be to change the way we’re held together.
August 29th, 2010 at 1:21 pm
Armando, did you read the article? It’s not saying you’d stay ‘old and wilting away’ forever, it’s saying you could potentially stop the painful and humiliating parts (the arthritis, loss of muscle tissue, bodily malfunctions) of getting old.
And that’s a very ignorant-and nasty-comment about cancer and HIV/AIDS, you must never have seen anyone struggle and lose to either of them. Our world is over-populated of it’s own accord, and to site two very painful and demoralizing diseases/viruses as population control is tasteless.
August 29th, 2010 at 6:08 pm
CH:
Quit being so sensitive. Also, want to talk about ignorant? Saying our world is over-populated of it’s own accord? Unfounded assertion, my friend. Our medical advancements have extended life expentencies from ~40-50yrs to 80yrs. THAT is not of the world’s own volition. That is a man made condition. As for the cancer/AIDS comment – I’ve lost someone to cancer, but, if you can’t move on and chuckle at what is, in all reality, a horrible thing, than you’ve lost your sense of self, and I feel for you. Salaam wa aleikum, my brothers.
September 23rd, 2010 at 8:22 pm
You’re an idiot!
October 8th, 2010 at 9:45 pm
Hmmm. Did anybody notice that the original post is dated April 1?
October 15th, 2010 at 6:35 pm
Step 1 elongate human life. Step 2 make human memory infinite (with limited memory what’s the point of unlimited life?).
October 22nd, 2010 at 8:47 pm
Since we are on the topic of immortality, I’d like to express why I would be against the idea. First of all, if we had this “resistance to aging”, if you will, it would make death that much worse. Think about it, right now, one way to cope with a loved one’s death is the general idea that everyone dies eventually. It’s a natural process. But if this technology were to go through, then death would no longer be something that everyone goes through. This means that if someone loses a friend or family member in a car accident, it would be infinitely harder to cope with. You have to live forever with the memory of your lost loved one. Sure, eventually you would get over it, but the initial grief would be terrible.
The other issue is simply the future of the human race and planet Earth. Let’s say, hypothetically, we manage to develop immortality, in the sense that we are resistant to death by “old age”. What will happen when the Earth is no longer hospitable? Would we be 100% reliant on developing the technology to colonize another planet? Surely overpopulation would eventually take over, and there will simply be no room left on this planet anyway.
I would hope that this technology can be used as a means of making our quality of life better, and giving us a longer lifespan, but the idea of immortality just doesn’t seem right to me.
November 4th, 2010 at 11:00 am
In a World with an ever increasing population, hardly any food, water shortages and a general apathy why on Earth would we want immortality?
Who is this for? The financially elite?
November 4th, 2010 at 11:03 am
What about my inheritance? No one would inherit anything ever again. More consumption. More debt. More interest on money that doesn’t exist. More of the likes of GeorgeW BUsh? No thanks I’ll take my chances.
November 4th, 2010 at 11:04 am
Just by the way, we already have it with DNA and atom transfer through our sperm and eggs.
December 21st, 2010 at 6:48 pm
I would have to agree with DF we can’t be immortal and even if we do become immortal what then my friends? Why should we do anything when we can always do it the next day? Life would lose its purpose because there would be no end to our life. Therefore we would have no drive to continue and our resources would vanish in the blink of an eye because no one would die .. However it would make an already overpopulated world more crowded and would essentially destroy the beauty of life. It would give man supreme dominance the conquerer of life. But sometimes we must concede and decide that we can’t live forever because it would destroy mankind’s society, structure, and beauty. For Gods’ sake we would become Gods because we would never die . Eventually we would become weary of the world and wish for the opportunity to die. People who are afraid to die are fools. Dying is nothing but another adventure it is not the end but a spiritual beginnning
December 29th, 2010 at 8:03 am
Eventually there will be life beyond this planet, and the world will always grow around you. Being immortal would bring ridiculous amounts of wisdom to the right people, and could essentially create Gods, I feel, if one were truly immortal. If tissue regenerated fast enough imagine the physical capabilities we would have if we worked towards it? It wouldn’t be for everyone, that’s for sure. Some would probably kill themselves before living on too long, I would imagine.
December 29th, 2010 at 8:05 am
@T2 That is stupid. THat’s like saying the only reason to do something anyway is because we’re eventually gonna die. -_-
February 28th, 2011 at 3:06 pm
Now I know where to try and get a job when I get out of college. If we havn’t cracked it by then.
May 25th, 2011 at 11:06 pm
Before we all start embracing immortality, how about we first embrace global birth control; not just zero population growth as a goal, but negative population growth. The nations of this world would be “green” in a generation’s time if all the people that had two or more children simply limited themselves to one, or even none! Instead of philanthropic foundations spending billions of dollars to eradicate poverty and disease, we’d all be better off if they could convince people that now is the time to stop recklessly and unreasonably breeding. Seriously, this world is already being over-run by human reproduction, we don’t need to start adding immortality into the mix.
December 13th, 2011 at 4:24 pm
[...] Jellyfish Evolves ImmortalityResearchers have documented the first immortal animal, a jellyfish species called Turritopsis nutricula. The species has been seen to reverse its aging and revert to its its earlier polyp stage, periodically restarting its lifecycle. The rejuvenation relies on transdifferation, the transformation of one mature (non-stem, or “differentiated”) cell type into another. All evidence suggests that Turritopsis can repeat this process indefinitely, meaning that it will never die as a consequence of aging, ever. Researchers suggested that studying the Turritopsis could lead to breakthroughs in reversing the human aging process. [...]