"And so, you see, I will never die."
Posted on 01/16/2016 10:05:02 AM PST by UnwashedPeasant
A team at Yale School of Medicine have identified a hormone, produced by the thymus glad, extends lifespan by 40 per cent.
Their findings reveal increased levels of the hormone, known as FGF21, protects the immune system against the ravages of age.
Researchers said the study could have implications in the future for improving immune function in the elderly, for obesity, and for diseases such as cancer and type 2 diabetes.
When it is functioning normally, the thymus produces new T cells for the immune system.
But with age, the gland becomes fatty and loses its ability to produce the vital cells.
This loss of new T cells in the body is one cause of increased risk of infections and certain cancers in the elderly.
Researchers led by Vishwa Deep Dixit, professor of comparative medicine and immunobiology at Yale, studied transgenic mice with elevated levels of FGF21.
They blocked the gene's function, before studying the impact of decreasing levels of FGF21 on the immune system.
Their results showed that increasing the level of FGF21 in old mice protected the thymus from age-related fatty degeneration and increased the ability of the thymus to produce new T cells.
Meanwhile, FGF21 deficiency accelerated the degeneration of the thymus in old mice.
Professor Dixit said: 'We found that FGF21 levels in thymic epithelial cells is several fold higher than in the liver, therefore FGF21 acts within the thymus to promote T cell production.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
Do you know how to make a hormone ?
Refuse to pay her.
There is no limit to the money that will be spent, and the aborted babies to be dissected and used in experiments that will stop the ruling elite from trying to obtain immortality.
If not as many people die, where do you put them all.
Possibly this could spur planetary immigration.
"And so, you see, I will never die."
I think that the effect is not from defatting the thymus, but from either preventing thymic cells from dying with age or by inducing cells in the thymus to become a certain cell type. The full article said that the mechanism of protection by the hormone FGF21 remains to be elucidated. But that would be my working hypothesis.
Lol from hubby and myself.
The reason there are 7 billion (or whatever) people on earth now is that better medicine extends the lifespan, and the fertility rate has not dropped accordingly. Most especially, the effect occurs because children who, in previous eras, would have died before the age of 5 now survive into adulthood and then have children.
I do not think that preventing immune system aging would have that much of an effect, because the people whose lifespans would be increased are already beyond reproductive age, since the immune system starts its major decline after age 65.
Is betaine what they’re talking about?
God has numbered man’s years to 120. It won’t matter what anyone does.
If we keep electing people like Obama and Hillary, who would want to use this hormone?
100+ is when you can really start enjoying life.
A classic!
No, I threw that it. But I think it was a bum steer.
No, thanks. I couldn’t bear 40% extra time on this miserable planet.
100 is the new 80
There is enough food to feed everyone on the planet, and there is enough room for everyone to live comfortably.
The problem is that we don't distribute the food or living space properly.
And, if you extend life at the far end of the span another 40%, most can’t work so where does the $$$ to live on come from?
I’ll pass and just leave it up to a power greater than I to decide.....
Now Social Security is really screwed.
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