Longevity: Selection - Design Problems, Selection Design For Postponed Aging, Selection On Drosophila Aging, Use Of Populations With Selectively Increased Longevity
genetic alter study organisms
One way scientists study a phenomenon is that they change it. In the study of aging, organisms with altered longevity are systems of choice for the unraveling of the biological mechanisms controlling aging. Selection is one of the tools that biologists use to alter the characteristics of organisms, from their size to their shape to their physiology. In this context, it is only natural to strive to alter longevity using selection, as a preamble to detailed analysis of the genetic control of longevity.
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It is one thing to select on coat color in mammals or bristle number in insects, but another to select on a functional character that depends on many distinct biochemical pathways. As dog breeding shows, it is possible to select stringently on relatively arbitrary features, like the color or oiliness of fur. But dog breeding also shows that selection programs that use a small number of breeders ru…
Longevity is difficult to select on because it is tied up with the action of natural selection. One way out of this difficulty is to turn it on its head. Since natural selection acts to mold survival automatically, then perhaps it can be used to do the work in selecting on longevity. This basic strategy is the foundation of most successful schemes to select on longevity. It is implemented in the …
While there are other organisms that have been subjected to this type of selection, some insects and mice in particular, most of the studies that use natural selection to increase longevity have employed Drosophila melanogaster, the common laboratory fruit fly. Though a handful of experiments of similar design were performed in
the period before 1980, none were designed specifically to increase…
The key to the use of organisms with increased longevity is that they must have slowed or abrogated the normal processes of aging. Organisms with reduced longevity may die because of novel pathologies, unrelated to normal mechanisms of aging. But this problem does not apply to longer-lived organisms. Consistent differences between organisms with increased longevity and closely related, normal-live…
A common misunderstanding of research that uses selection to increase longevity is that the researchers propose to select on humans as a next step. But this approach is not only unethical, it would also be extremely inefficient. Humans have only a few generations each century, making the prospect of a significant response to selection on human longevity dim within the near future. A more appropri…
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