Time of Our Lives: The Science of Human Aging PDF
Preview Time of Our Lives: The Science of Human Aging
TIME OF OUR LIVES This page intentionally left blank TIME OF OUR LIVES The Science of Human Aging T O M K I R K W O O D OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS Oxford New York Athens Auckland Bangkok Bogota Buenos Aires Calcutta Cape Town Chennai Dar es Salaam Delhi Florence Hong Kong Istanbul Karachi Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Mumbai Nairobi Paris Sao Paulo Shanghai Singapore Taipei Tokyo Toronto Warsaw and associated companies in Berlin Ibadan Copyright © 1999 by Tom Kirkwood First published by Oxford University Press, Inc., 1999 First issued as an Oxford University Press paperback, 2000 198 Madison Avenue, New York, New York 10016 Oxford is a registered trademark of Oxford University Press All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of Oxford University Press, Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Kirkwood, Tom. Time of our lives: the science of human aging / by Tom Kirkwood. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-19-512824-9 (Cloth) ISBN 0-19-513926-7 (Pbk.) 1.Aging—popular works. 1.Title. QP86.K52 1999 612.6'7—dc21 98-46932 1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2 Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper For my mother, Deborah Kirkwood, and in memory of my father, Kenneth Kirkwood Dangerous pavements. But I face the ice this year With my father's stick. Seamus Heaney, '1.1.87' This page intentionally left blank CONTENTS Preface viii 1 The funeral season 1 2 Atitudes to ageing 12 3 What's in a name? 22 4 Longevity records 39 5 The unnecessary nature of ageing 52 6 Why ageing occurs 63 7 Cels in crisis 81 8 Molecules and mistakes 100 9 Organs and orchestras 118 10 The cancer connection 147 11 Menopause and the big bang 161 12 Eat less, live longer 174 13 Why do women live longer than men? 184 14 The Genie of the Genome 196 15 In search of Wonka-Vite 212 16 Making more time 230 Epilogue 243 Notes 257 Bibliography 261 Index 269 Preface Today's older people are the vanguard of an extraordinary revolu- tion in longevity that is radically changing the structure of society and altering our perceptions of life and death. Improvements in sanitation, housing, healthcare and education have resulted in huge increases in expectation of life. Countless lives are now lived to the full that might otherwise have been cut short. The price for this success - and make no mistake, it is a success - is that we now face the challenge of ageing. Time of Our Lives is about the science of human ageing - one of the last great mysteries of the living world. Questions like 'Why do we age?', 'How does ageing happen?', 'Why do some species live longer than others?', 'Why do women live longer than men?', 'Do some parts of the body wear out sooner than others?' and 'Why do women have a menopause halfway through their life span?' beg for answers. The more practical question 'Can science slow my ageing process, or help me age better?' concerns us all. For all of these reasons, human ageing is at the forefront of scientific, medical and social research and of political thinking as never before. If we are to meet and overcome the immense challenges of adjusting to the worldwide demographic revolution, with all that this means in terms of longevity, economics and, above all, quality of life, we need to be armed with better knowledge. Time of Our Lives is written to be intelligible to a reader who has no training in science, but an interest to know. It is also written for those whose daily work brings them increasingly into contact with PREFACE IX older people. It even, I hope, has messages for the policy-makers, those we elect to lead us into the uncharted territories of a greying world. It is not a textbook and yet it goes to the heart of current research. Although I have been at pains to make every part of the book informative and intelligible to the lay reader, I have avoided oversimplication so that the real issues can be understood. I make no excuse for asking the reader to work a little harder in some chapters than others to follow material that may be unfamiliar. My side of the bargain is that I have also worked hard to make the science as accessible as possible, using everyday examples to help. The focus is on ageing, of course, but quite a lot of other interesting science has been included to set the stage. In writing for a diverse readership, there is an unavoidable danger that one will sometimes explain a point at greater length, or at a simpler level, than the reader requires. Where I have failed to get the balance right, I hope that this will not distract too much. Many colleagues have helped my research over the years. Particular thanks are due to Steven Austad, Thomas Cremer, loan Davies, John Grimley Evans, Caleb Finch, Claudio Franceschi, Leonard Hayflick, Robin Holliday, Tom Johnson, Axel Kowald, Gordon Lithgow, George M. Martin, Ed Masoro, John Maynard Smith, Leslie Orgel, Linda Partridge, Olivia Pereira Smith, Chris Potten, Patrick Rabbitt, Francois Schachter, Daryl Shanley, Jim Smith, Richard Sprott, Raymond Tallis, Roger Thatcher, James Vaupel and Rudi Westendorp. I would also like to express my appreciation to the organisations that have supported my research at various times, particularly the UK Medical Research Council, Research into Ageing, the Wellcome Trust, the Dunhill Medical Trust and the UK National Biological Standards Board. My agent, Felicity Bryan, first suggested that I write this book and has nudged me gently but firmly towards its completion, an event that I am sure she must at times have begun to doubt. My visit to Navrongo, described in Chapter I, was made possible through the work of Betty Kirkwood, and I am grateful to the many
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