Chris Patil of Ouroboros is a postdoctoral fellow, currently working with Judith Campisi in the Life Sciences division of the Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. Here is Chris's response to the question I recently sent to a number of biogerontologists:
.
The main purpose of ageing research at present is NOT to make people young and immortal as is often publicised in the media, but instead to prevent/combat disease and disability, allowing everyone to live healthier lives for longer. Is this media representation of ageing research detrimental to the true focus of ageing research? If you disagree with the main purpose of ageing research outlined in the question please state why?
.
.
I don’t believe in a monolithic entity called “aging research”, and consequently I don’t believe that that entity has a “true focus”. Aging is a huge field; there are any number of ways to engage with it; there is consequently tremendous diversity among scientists who consider themselves to be involved in aging research. There are distinct sub-communities, certainly, which can be classified according to their priorities and focus; in comparisons between these sub-communities, patterns do emerge. For instance, I’ve noticed a tradeoff between immediacy and scope — that is, those whose work can benefit elderly people today tend to have fairly modest ambitions compared to those whose labors will take some time to bear fruit. A lot of this has to do with individual priorities, and where individual scientists feel like they can do the most good and/or do the work that makes them happiest.
.
I feel most comfortable speaking for myself and my community — let’s call us “academic biogerontologists” -- whom I’m going to (conveniently) define as the set of individuals devoted primarily to the production of fundamental research in the biology of aging, who primarily work in universities or similarly organized institutions, and whose work is primarily published in peer-reviewed journals.
.
For academic biogerontologists, there are two related aims of aging research. The explicit, near-term goal is improving our understanding of the aging process at multiple levels — at the cellular and molecular levels, but also (as tools get better) at the level of cell-cells interactions (i.e., tissues) as well as the gemisch of global gene expression studies that fall under the “systems biology” umbrella. The (occasionally) implicit, longer-term goal is to use this understanding to create interventions that will improve the health and happiness of human beings — and here the ambitions range from the treatment of single aging-related diseases to therapies that will delay or even reverse the aging process itself.
.
For us, the two processes go hand in hand, and both are essential. Fundamental research into the mechanisms of aging is constantly revealing new connections between well-studied systems (like nutritional control of cell growth) and the basic biology of aging. It is from these connections, from this knowledge, that the interventionist tools of the future will emerge. Both sorts of work can and should be undertaken simultaneously, if not by the same groups then in an open community where there is a great deal of communication across the aisle, so that both types of scholars are learning from each other at an optimum rate. Indeed, we’re beginning to see some of the first pharmaceuticals developed by academic-industrial collaborations and academic spinoff companies; it’s an exciting time.
.
One thing that we are constantly learning from basic studies is that as much as we know (especially, as much as we’ve learned in the past 15 years or so, a period that I think of as the dawning era of the modern biology of aging), we could always know more. One example is the recent discovery in model organisms that stem cells don’t function well in aged microenvironments — in aged niches, they either don’t regenerate well or become dysregulated; for those of you just joining us, having dysregulated telomerase-positive immortal cells in your body is potentially a fairly bad thing. These recent observations have caused us to seriously rethink the strategies that will be required to effectively use stem cell transplantation in the treatment of age-related disease. So I don’t think we’re ever going to reach the point where we can take off our gloves and say, “This is a solved problem; no more fundamental research for us!” Not that I think anyone is seriously advocating a moratorium on future basic studies, any more than they were advocating injecting old people with huge doses of undifferentiated cells. There are differences of opinion on the relative import of basic vs applied work but inasmuch as both fields are far smaller than they should be I don’t think the time has arrived for debating tradeoffs between the two.
.
But I’ve digressed extensively. Do I think that media representations are positive or negative? To the extent that they spread the word in a measured way, like the piece in the Economist earlier this year. I think they’re largely positive. Even when individual articles get their “zing” from focusing on what I consider to be quite long-term goals, I think they still do a tremendous amount of good by raising consciousness about the biology of aging. We’re entering a period of history when people will become more and more willing to appreciate the benefit of long-term thinking, especially as related to technology — we’re already seeing that with the environment, and I think aging research and anti-aging medicine will be another example. One of my scientific heroes, Carl Sagan, popularized space exploration and even the nascent field of exobiology by making bold statements about the longest-term and wildest possibilities, and in so doing he inspired a generation of young scientists. I don’t see any reason why aging should be different: As long as we’re scientifically responsible, honest about the current state of affairs, and reasonable in our predictions, why shouldn’t we emphasize the long-term payoff of our work? Full steam ahead!
.
Chris
.
.
