Must an AGING PROCESS be universal? was Defining...

[anackerp at rain.org]

Oliver Bogler (obogler at ucsd.edu) wrote:

: I think that these 100 or more processes are theoretical, and far from
: proven. Some people think that there is more likely to be a master clock
: that regulates ageing, or at least some aspects of it. For example, many
: researchers working on celluar senescence currently favour telomere length
: as the clock that drives senescence. 

: In any case people are all biochemically similar: you'd find the same
: processes in all of us. What may differ is the environmental influences we
: encounter. For example, differences in fat content of the diet determines
: the rate of heart disease: people who eat more fat are more likely to have
: heart disease and die of it. But such diseases are not ageing. 
: I think that there is confusion therefore, between ageing, which could
: very well be a single process with pleiotropic effects, and the
: accumulation of environmental wear and tear which is cleary multifactorial

	We can be biochemically similar, not biochemically equal, and 
have biochemical individuality.  Pollens can affect me differently than 
they affect you.  Fats can be processed by your body differently enough 
from the way mine processes fats to cause no weight gain for you but 
weight gain for me.  So, besides understanding our environment, we need 
to investigate and understand our biochemical individuality.  Even if the 
theory of different processes of aging is wrong and there is just one 
master control (and the 100 processes are only manifestations of the 
master control?) I would want to know if our biochemical individuality 
has an affect on that master control (and of course how to affect it 
positively).