Thread: Does Stem Cell research hold the key to eternal youth?

Apparently, researchers have found ways to grow a (very limited) number of new body parts for people who need them from their own stem cells. Nothing flashy (yet), but it shows where the tech could go. Ten-Year-Old Girl Receives Major Vein Grown From Her Own Stem Cells | Singularity HubSuppose it were possible to grow any body part they wanted. Could you gradually replace your whole body via body part transplants? Or maybe just your whole body minus your brain, so you could maybe have a 80 year old brain in a 20 year old body?

Even if you didn't have stem cells on reserve for you, I suppose you could just mix eggs and sperm until you get a few "compatible donor" stem cells. So maybe the 20 year old body isn't your own body (more like the body of someone that could have been related to you), but it is still young and strong.

Imagine some 60 year old woman who decides, instead of having a "face lift", to have young skin literally transplanted/grafted onto her face, so her face doesn't just look young. It is young. Would that just be the next logical step in cosmetic surgery?

I agree to this, stemcell's hold the key to eternal youth. Not only in looking younger, but also in being younger. The problem there is that there is no way of controlling the stemcells to the extent needed for a safe method, yet.

Total body transplantation? Is... ridiculous, to say the least, i don't think that would be the easiest way. Haha..

Originally Posted by Zwolver

Total body transplantation? Is... ridiculous, to say the least, i don't think that would be the easiest way. Haha..

I'm kind of thinking along the lines of gradually replacing body parts, piece by piece. Your liver fails, so you implant a new liver. Your hair goes gray, so you implant new hair folicles. Your face gets all wrinkley, so you get a skin graft. Maybe you'd keep your original bones a lot longer (or just reinforce them with bone supplements grown from stem cells.) Most likely you wouldn't be able to replace lost brain cells very easily.

The big problem with transplants right now, is your immune system attacks the new organ. (Unless it's compatible enough to avoid this.) If the organ were an exact match to your DNA, that probably wouldn't happen.

Not eating GM food or being around toxic chemicals or being stressed and caged for a life time is the key to this eternal look you're so desperately searching for. Everything dies at some point, nothing is eternal.

Transplants themselves won't lead to eternal life. After a certain set period of time, the ability of our cells to replicate themselves degrades. We become weak and fragile and our organs begin to fail. In order to stop this, you would have to override the built-in timer on our cells so that they replicate indefinitely. Simply replacing a failing organ will not prolong your life, you'll just die with a nice shiny new liver.

Thats what the stem cells are for. They replace the cells gradually, instead of just some bodyparts, or organs.

Originally Posted by Flick Montana

Transplants themselves won't lead to eternal life. After a certain set period of time, the ability of our cells to replicate themselves degrades. We become weak and fragile and our organs begin to fail. In order to stop this, you would have to override the built-in timer on our cells so that they replicate indefinitely. Simply replacing a failing organ will not prolong your life, you'll just die with a nice shiny new liver.

I'm pretty sure that's because of "Telemeres". They're a chemical boundary that protects your DNA from degrading as cells replicate. The Telemeres in most cells break down over time as they replicate, until when it wears out the DNA sequence isn't preserved anymore and the cells undergo senescence and stop replicating. However, the Telemeres in a stem cell don't break down so fast.

Telomere - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


I agree that transplanting one or two organs wouldn't make a difference, but I'm thinking like if you gradually replaced 90% of your body over time. Eventually your brain would wear out, still (can't replace that unless you want to create a new person.)

I gave a short reciation lecture last year to some biology students and came home to tell my wife about it. I said I spoke about cells, DNA, talmarines, etc. She asked me what Prince Caspian had to do with it and I pretended to not be completely confused. Later, after googling Talmarines I realized the scope of my error and I was completely embarrassed.

Curse her biology degree.

The part about telomeres that i find baffling, is that our cells have a hard time replenishing them. Apart from birds no vertebrate species has a decent repair rate of their telomeres. But still, it only protects the chromosomes at replication. So the stable, nonreplicating cells should be unaffected. Which they are. Our brain cells don't have anything to suffer from decaying telomeres. The problem with those, is their unability to replenisch themselves.

Talmarines and telomeres.. i can't see how you could have made that mistake, but i guess where there is a will, there's a way.

I suspect that the reason for telomeres decaying like that is that evolution "purposefully" (insofar as it has a mind) imposed it on us.

A shorter life span leads to faster reproduction rates, which in turn speeds the rate of mutation, and makes the population more resilient. The evolution process requires previous generations to die off and make room for new ones.

However... I think it's about time we stopped letting evolution make all of our decisions for us.

Originally Posted by Zwolver

Talmarines and telomeres.. i can't see how you could have made that mistake, but i guess where there is a will, there's a way.

Temporary receptive aphasia?

Originally Posted by kojax

However... I think it's about time we stopped letting evolution make all of our decisions for us.

This, is a good quote...

Evolution has ruled us for billions of years. Let's rule it instead

Are we that desperate for something to do? Picking your nose passes the time. We going to take over all the ups and downs of Specie burps and farts? westwind.

We haven't had completely answer to it, but now stem cells are our biggest opportunity on life. Already Roman Catholic has accepted induced pluripotent stem cells to use to men's bodies. Just go ahead to the ideal.

UCLA Stem Cell Researchers Use Gene Therapy To Restore Immune Systems In 'Bubble Babies'
UCLA Stem Cell Researchers Use Gene Therapy To Restore Immune Systems In 'Bubble Babies'

... Although it has possibility of modification on man's body.

DNA Blueprint Maps How A Heart Becomes A Heart
DNA Blueprint Maps How A Heart Becomes A Heart

At last, defective organs will be replaced to better functinal organs which developed stem cells in your body, possibly.

?

Ehm, it's something totally different for a heart to form with a baby, or a heart to form in a petri dish without any other kind of tissue around it. Cells use placement as a map to what they'll be. You can't (yet) create anything usefull with stemcells like that. Other then a clone or a tumor..

New Insights Into Muscle Stem Cells: At The Right Place At The Right Time

Empowered muscle is in the near future.

I'll bring another news site here next time, and I'll put comments been refined a bit.

Stem Cell-Based Regenerative Medicine Research May Be Advanced By Discovery Of Reprogramming Signature

Already iPSCs made many organs now, but the function isn't completely uncovered in human's tissue. When we'll get completely controlling on stem cells, we can get the longest life.
I'll get the source website of only Medical News Today for a while, though many news sites released on eternal youth in the Internet.

Potential Cell Therapy For Bowel Disease Suggested By Research

Stem cells from cord blood by an infant who has been born already have enough possiblity to treat a man. The infant who was baptized soon after born will work first time for people by his cord blood cells.