For millions of years, intelligent life humans were born on the ordinary life planet of the earth. Since then, the earth has been upgraded from an ordinary life planet to an intelligent life planet, and it has become an extraordinary planet in the universe.
Human beings are very different from other life, because we are intelligent life, relying on wisdom can create many miracles, can enter the era of science and technology, can walk out of the earth to explore the mysteries of the universe. However, human beings have some similarities with other lives. There is a natural law that all lives must obey, and that is the law of life and death.
Whether you are a simple primitive life or a complex advanced intelligent life, from the day you were born, you will face the fate of death in the near future. Birth, old age, sickness and death is a natural law, a basic rule of the universe, and nothing can change it. And the law of entropy increase tells us that nothing in the universe can be eternal, even the universe will be annihilated, let alone human beings.
Of course, the lifespan of human beings is far from being compared with the lifespan of celestial bodies. The lifespan of stars is as little as tens of millions of years, or as many as tens of billions, while the lifespan of human beings is only a short century or so. For humans, this life span is not enough for us. In ancient times, many emperors had dreams of immortality and wanted to develop elixir, but natural laws did not allow such things to happen.
From a scientific point of view, we all understand that immortality is against science and is impossible to achieve. Scientists naturally don’t want to study immortality. This is a thing that can never be achieved. Although immortality is just a dream, it can be achieved through the power of science to continuously extend human life.
Before studying how to extend human lifespan, the first step for scientists is to figure out what is the limit of human lifespan? Scientists use three methods to explore the limit of human life.
The first method is to speculate based on the growth period of mammals. We all know that humans evolved from mammals. So in essence, humans are also mammals, and most of the mammals on the earth have a life span of 5-7 times the growth period. According to this law, it is estimated that the life span of human beings is about 150-170 years old.
The second method is to calculate based on the mammalian sexual maturity time. Generally, the life span of mammals is 8-10 times that of sexual maturity, and human sexual maturity is about 14-15 years old. Therefore, the limit life span of humans should be 140- Between 150 years old.
The third method is to calculate according to the Hayflick limit. This method is to calculate from the aspect of cell division. We all know that the human body is composed of a large number of cells. The division and renewal of cells maintains human life. When cell division does not continue, human life will come to an end.
Cell division is not unlimited. According to the research of scientists, the number of divisions of human cells is about 50 times, and the renewal cycle after each division is about 2.5 years. Based on this calculation, the life expectancy of human beings is 125 years old.
So which of the above three methods is more scientific and persuasive? Obviously the third is more scientific, and according to the current record, the oldest person is Jeanne Carmen, an old French lady, who was 122 years old when she died in 1997.
In addition to the human limit lifespan estimated by the above three methods, in 2015, British biogerontologist Aubrey de Gray put forward a new conjecture that the limit lifespan of humans is 1,000 years old. Then this conjecture has Is it scientifically based?
Aubrey de Gray’s hypothesis that human life span is 1,000 years old is not an unfounded guess. He pointed out that the human life span is 1,000 years, which means that through genetic technology, cell repair and other methods, the limit life span of human beings can be increased to 1,000 years.
To increase the life expectancy of human beings to 1,000 years, we must first understand what factors affect human life span? I believe many friends know that scientists have discovered that telomeres are an important element that affects human life.
Telomere is a small piece of DNA-protein complex that exists at the end of linear chromosomes in eukaryotic cells. Its function is to protect the ends of chromosomes from melting and degradation, and to prevent DNA from falling off during cell division. You can think of DNA as a shoelace, then the telomere is the plastic head at the end of the shoelace. It can prevent the shoelace from fraying and maintain its shape.
Each time a cell divides, the telomeres will shorten. When the telomeres can no longer be shortened, the cell has reached a state of senescence. At this time, the cell no longer divides, and life has come to an end. If we can reactivate the telomere and restore it to the infant stage, can the cell division continue? The answer is yes.
At present, scientists have achieved initial success and can reactivate telomeres to the infant stage and restore cell division. However, scientists discovered that after the telomeres returned to the infant stage, the cells continued to divide, but a person’s lifespan did not increase much. This shows that the factors affecting longevity are not only telomeres, but also other aspects.
British biogerontologist Aubrey de Gray believes that life extension does not need to start from the number of cell divisions, but delays the replacement cycle, and makes no mistakes in the replication process. Cells will continue to make mistakes in the process of replication, which will damage the cells. If we can study cell repair solutions, then the cells will be perfect in the process of division and replication, avoiding many mistakes, which can also greatly increase the lifespan of human beings. .
More importantly, if we can make the cycle of cell replication longer, the life span can also be greatly increased. At present, the renewal cycle of human cells is 2.5 years. If this cycle can be doubled or even tenfolded, then the life span of human beings can be doubled or tenfolded invisibly. In this way, human life can reach 1,000 years.
So can human technology do this? There is no problem at all. At present, humans have initially understood some of the mysteries of human cells. I believe that in the near future, we can make various modifications to cells to make them more powerful. At that time, it was not a dream for humans to reach 1,000 years of life. Perhaps in the eyes of many people, 1,000 years of life is a relatively long lifespan. If it can be achieved, humans should be satisfied.
But in fact, 1000 years old is a very short period of time relative to the future road to the stars and the sea. Every interstellar voyage may take thousands of years, thousands of years or even longer time. Therefore, the life span of 1,000 years is only the starting point for human life. We need a longer life span for interstellar exploration. To achieve this, rapid development of science and technology is required.