Another tidbit from "Living to 100"

From: Brian D Williams (talon57@well.com)
Date: Fri Nov 24 2000 - 13:28:44 MST


Another interesting story from "Living to 100".

Interested in finding out how much of longevity might be attributed
to genetic components the researchers searched for families of long
lived persons.

They were informed by other researchers that this was unlikely
because then current wisdom had any genetic involvement at being
the result of thousands of genes.

The researchers in fact found a picture in the paper of a man
celebrating his 108th birthday. Looking over his shoulder was his
103 year old sister! They also had a 97 year old sister and
informed the researchers had they arrived two years earlier they
could have talked to two other sisters aged 101 and 102.

The researchers then found two other such families. This pointed to
the possibility of a few genes rather than many.

Now the REALLY interesting part "There was a strong likelihood of
family intermarriage by cousins in two of the three families.
Intermarriage has often been associated with the development of
harmful inherited diseases....We may have found a mirror-image case
in which a positive trait, that of extreme longevity has emerged as
a result of intermarriage. This discovery reinforced our belief
that a small number of genes-perhaps fewer than 10-might be
responsible for extreme longevity in the R family."

Shades of the Howards huh? Somebody get Robert a grant.

Back to the book.....

Brian

Member:
Extropy Institute, www.extropy.org
Adler Planetarium www.adlerplanetarium.org
Life Extension Foundation, www.lef.org
National Rifle Association, www.nra.org, 1.800.672.3888
Ameritech Data Center Chicago, IL, Local 134 I.B.E.W



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