I have been reading with interest the various ideas people have on the
control of ageing rate. It seems to me (although of course tehy might
disagree) that the telomere loss process and the mitochondrial oxygen
radical idea are special cases o my suggestion (based on the "Life
Maintenance Processes" theory by Dick Cutler, one of his many) that the
ageing process is mor really controlled by the organism but is an effect of
the tendency of things to fall apart (thermodynamics). The differences
between organism, cells, etc in this theory come from the different
abilities of these organisms, cells, etc to maintain their life processes
by repair, prevention, etc, but they still result in different ageing
rates. A model system could be automobile ageing...not the same for
different cars, since they start with different quality components and
are maintained with differential effectiveness. The real puzzle for
proponents of this theory is the germ line...how are these cells protected
from the ageing process or reset to the non-aged conditions? Laura
Hoopes
