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Author Janne Teller wrote, “from the moment we are born, we begin to die”.

CAKE echoed this sentiment in their song ‘Sheep Go To Heaven’.

It’s all hyperbole, because it sounds significantly better than ‘from birth, we start ageing’.

Despite advancements in skincare, cosmetic surgery, and diets that promise to keep you healthier for longer, you will age. There’s no escaping it.

It’s even happening to Seth – true story.

Also, you should probably get started on that retirement fund.

At the same time, modern medicine has extended the lifespan of the average person, and scientists at the University of California San Diego (UCSD) may be one step closer to delaying the ageing process, reports CNN.

A team of scientists studied aging in yeast — chosen because its cells are easily manipulated — to try to understand if different cells age at the same rate, and for the same reason.

What they found was intriguing. Even cells made of the same genetic materials and within the same environment aged in “strikingly distinct ways,” according to the scientists, who published their findings in the journal Science.

Roughly half of the yeast cells aged due to a gradual decline in the nucleolus – the round body at the centre of a cell. The other half aged because of a problem associated with the mitochondria which account for the cell’s energy.

They discovered this using various techniques including micro fluids and computer modelling.

They then performed further tests to understand how cells behaved.

“To understand how cells make these decisions, we identified the molecular processes underlying each ageing route and the connections among them, revealing a molecular circuit that controls cell ageing, analogous to electric circuits that control home appliances,” said Nan Hao, senior author of the study and an associate professor in UCSD’s division of biological sciences’ molecular biology section.

They found that they could manipulate the process of ageing using computer simulations to reprogram and modify the cell’s DNA.

They were then able to create a “novel ageing route,” with a dramatically extended lifespan. This, researchers believe, could ultimately lead to the possibility of delaying human ageing.

“This is an ageing path that never existed, but because we understand how it is regulated, we can basically design or regulate a new ageing path,” Hao told CNN.

The idea is that further research could lead to the possibility of rationally designing gene or chemical-based therapies to reprogram how human cells age.

This research will involve taking the existing study and applying it to more complex organisms, and eventually humans.

Hey, if I can get a few more years on the planet, you’ll hear no complaints from me.

We will, however, add this to the extensive list of reasons to combat climate change.

Living for longer means nothing if the planet is uninhabitable.

[source:cnn]