The Molecular Genetics of Aging

The molecular genetics of aging or life-span determination is an expanding field. One reason is because many people would consider it desirable if hu­ man life span could be extended. Indeed, it is difficult not to be fascinated by tales of the life and death of people who have succeeded in living a very long life. Because of this, we have placed at the head of this book the chapter by Perls et al. on Centenerians and the Genetics of Longevity. Perls and his coauthors convincingly argue that, while the average life expectancy might be mostly determined by environmental factors because the average person has an average genotype, extremely long life spans are genetically determined. Of course, studying humans to uncover the genetics of aging is not ideal, not so much because one cannot easily perform experiments as because they live such a long time. This is why most of this book describes the current state of research with model organisms such as yeast, worms, flies, and mice. J aswinski focuses on yeast and how metabolic activity and stress resistance affect the longevity of Saccharomyces cerevisiae. In the process, he discusses the concept of aging as applied to a unicellular organism such as yeast and the importance of metabolism and stress resistance for aging in all organisms.

This book offers insight into the current state of investigation into the genetic basis of aging and longevity. It has been written by scientists at the forefront of their field, thus providing a cross-section of current research. The topics covered include work with model organisms such as yeast, fruit flies, the nematode C. elegans, and mice. The most recent findings on the genetics of centenarians and the link between reproduction and life span in humans are also treated. The level of investigation ranges from the identification of life span determining genes by classic epidemiological methods to direct manipulation of rates of aging by molecular biological techniques in the most experimentally tractable systems. Further, it critically examines the significance of some lines of investigation and highlights those theories which may be most capable of providing a synthetic view of current data in the field of aging.