I'd like to share with world some citation of my friend, Mikhail Batin.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/longevity.party/permalink/702729823136345/
"I would like to describe to you my position about the organization of fight against aging.
There are numerous scientific and practical areas of research, which may significantly increase human lifespan.
1. Clinical trials of combinations of drugs, which are known to reduce human mortality. For this purpose rapamycin, ibuprofen, metformin as well as many biologically active substances, such as curcumin, fish oil, etc can be used. More than 100 of potential anti-aging drugs are revealed to date. It seems reasonable to perform their clinical trials. At first, trials should be performed on people over 80 years to get results fast. At the same time clinical trials on the middle age group should be performed studing biomarkers of aging.
2. More effective analogs of rapamycin, metformin, etc with fewer side effects should be searched and synthesized. Subsequently we should study the effect of their combinations on the lifespan of old mammals.
3. Introduction of aging diagnosis in clinical practice. It is necessary to compare changes in physiological parameters such as heart rate variability with the results of various complex assays (analysis of transcriptome, epigenome, etc.). These parameters should be compared with the parameters after anti-aging therapies.
4. The achievements of genetic engineering should be transferred into gene therapy. Genetic engineering approaches resulted in 2-10-fold increase in the lifespan of model animals. Now it is necessary to repeat these results using longevity promoting gene delivery to already old animals.
http://mariakonovalenko.wordpress.com/2014/09/23/longevity-gene-therapy-is-the-best-way-to-defeat-aging/
5. Therapeutic cloning, an approach to create organs using embryogenesis mechanisms.
It should be noted that in recent years the situation has changed and there have been performed many inspiring experiments in the field of longevity. However, the pace of research and its funding remains extremely unsatisfactory.
There is a set of cultural, political, historical and psychological reasons why the situation is not satisfactory, why aging is not recognized as a disease. In some cases it is still regarded as a problem, but of social, not biological origin.
Here is just a small list of reasons why we can not still begin large-scale research on prolongation of human life:
There is an absolute priority of short-term over long-term goals. People are always busy with urgent, they often do not have planning horizon of more than five years, but beyond this horizon is a person's death. Thus, the problem of aging and death almost does not exist in the human mind. Aging and death are considered as something that will happen in the distant future, almost never.
Investors think about their own benefit, but not about the benefit of others. Economic interests dominate over the desire to prolong their own life. It turns out that people appreciate money more than the ability to stay alive.
Death is justified and embellished. In society fear of death is considered as something shameful. This results in virtually no interest in the idea of fighting for life at any price. This is one of the reasons why despite the significant success in cryobiology, in the conservation of large biological objects at very low temperatures, there is such a low interest in cryonics. Cryopreservation of dead person brain is the best thing that can be done in the worst circumstances. Cryonics is an opportunity to postpone the solution of the problem, which can not be solved today, until the emergence of appropriate technologies in the future.
The quality of life is contrasted to its duration. The idea of improving the quality of life is almost always accompanied by the underestimation of the value of the possibility to stay alive. Although it seems to be obvious that these phenomena are based on the same biological mechanisms. Under the same conditions the quality of life is better for that individual, whose life expectancy is higher.
For example, many oncologists do not notice that the treatment that extends the maximum lifespan have protective effect against cancer. If you do not reduce the incidence of cancer, you can not increase the maximum lifespan, which is the best achievement in terms of aging prevention.
It is regrettable that in different kinds of experiments scientists often do not determine the life expectancy of model animals and compare it to control group. This is because the grants are provided for specific studies of various treatments and there is no money for studies of lifespan duration.
It is obvious that such a simple experiment as studies of the drug combination effects on the life expectancy could be carried out back in the 70s. This did not happen as the opinion of a small number of scientists who studied aging was not taken into account. Moreover, some of the science officials have stated that it is immoral to prolong life.
Actually the situation is reversed. To fight against aging is primarily an ethical choice. If human life is our absolute priority the research of longevity is a choice in favor of the good. Omission is the complicity of evil, death of billions of people. In my opinion, ethical, but not the economic aspect of this issue may become a driving force of anti-aging research.
It seems to me that the discussion about reducing the economic burden on the state with the help of aging research is not as inspiring as the idea of saving a person's life, because a person's life is the highest value.
What could be done today to accelerate research and clinical trials in the field of longevity?
First of all, there is a need for a well-organized conference in the United States, where not only scientific, but social and political aspects of the fight against aging will be discussed. It could serve as a trigger for civic engagement in the fight against aging. We need to convey to society the idea that people's lives depend on the research and funding for longevity studies is extremely low.
Also it is necessary to make a crowdfunding project with a big advertising budget on studies of anti-aging drug combinations. The wrong way is to postulate that we just want to find the anti-aging drug, because it has to be more impressive. One of the reasons to use crowdfunding is that it can alter existing public opinion. Another important reason to use crowdfunding for anti-aging drug study is that many potential anti-aging substances can’t be patented because they have been established for a long time for other uses.
Such projects are already launched but their funding is not satisfactory:
https://tilt-open-8ab279af6b1e.tilt.com/liberate-pharmaceuticals
An exception is the Ice Bucket Challenge, which has raised more than $ 90 million during only one month. The courage and perseverance are required to create something similar in the area of fight against aging.
I suppose that investors and government would be cautious until they understand that public attitude has moved towards the support of longevity studies.
The third thing that has to be done is to publish an article signed by reputable scientists, in which the biological relationship between aging and age-related diseases would be proved.
I think that is the plan of action. A key aspect of success of this approach would be the team, which will work on it."
https://www.facebook.com/groups/longevity.party/permalink/702729823136345/
"I would like to describe to you my position about the organization of fight against aging.
There are numerous scientific and practical areas of research, which may significantly increase human lifespan.
1. Clinical trials of combinations of drugs, which are known to reduce human mortality. For this purpose rapamycin, ibuprofen, metformin as well as many biologically active substances, such as curcumin, fish oil, etc can be used. More than 100 of potential anti-aging drugs are revealed to date. It seems reasonable to perform their clinical trials. At first, trials should be performed on people over 80 years to get results fast. At the same time clinical trials on the middle age group should be performed studing biomarkers of aging.
2. More effective analogs of rapamycin, metformin, etc with fewer side effects should be searched and synthesized. Subsequently we should study the effect of their combinations on the lifespan of old mammals.
3. Introduction of aging diagnosis in clinical practice. It is necessary to compare changes in physiological parameters such as heart rate variability with the results of various complex assays (analysis of transcriptome, epigenome, etc.). These parameters should be compared with the parameters after anti-aging therapies.
4. The achievements of genetic engineering should be transferred into gene therapy. Genetic engineering approaches resulted in 2-10-fold increase in the lifespan of model animals. Now it is necessary to repeat these results using longevity promoting gene delivery to already old animals.
http://mariakonovalenko.wordpress.com/2014/09/23/longevity-gene-therapy-is-the-best-way-to-defeat-aging/
5. Therapeutic cloning, an approach to create organs using embryogenesis mechanisms.
It should be noted that in recent years the situation has changed and there have been performed many inspiring experiments in the field of longevity. However, the pace of research and its funding remains extremely unsatisfactory.
There is a set of cultural, political, historical and psychological reasons why the situation is not satisfactory, why aging is not recognized as a disease. In some cases it is still regarded as a problem, but of social, not biological origin.
Here is just a small list of reasons why we can not still begin large-scale research on prolongation of human life:
There is an absolute priority of short-term over long-term goals. People are always busy with urgent, they often do not have planning horizon of more than five years, but beyond this horizon is a person's death. Thus, the problem of aging and death almost does not exist in the human mind. Aging and death are considered as something that will happen in the distant future, almost never.
Investors think about their own benefit, but not about the benefit of others. Economic interests dominate over the desire to prolong their own life. It turns out that people appreciate money more than the ability to stay alive.
Death is justified and embellished. In society fear of death is considered as something shameful. This results in virtually no interest in the idea of fighting for life at any price. This is one of the reasons why despite the significant success in cryobiology, in the conservation of large biological objects at very low temperatures, there is such a low interest in cryonics. Cryopreservation of dead person brain is the best thing that can be done in the worst circumstances. Cryonics is an opportunity to postpone the solution of the problem, which can not be solved today, until the emergence of appropriate technologies in the future.
The quality of life is contrasted to its duration. The idea of improving the quality of life is almost always accompanied by the underestimation of the value of the possibility to stay alive. Although it seems to be obvious that these phenomena are based on the same biological mechanisms. Under the same conditions the quality of life is better for that individual, whose life expectancy is higher.
For example, many oncologists do not notice that the treatment that extends the maximum lifespan have protective effect against cancer. If you do not reduce the incidence of cancer, you can not increase the maximum lifespan, which is the best achievement in terms of aging prevention.
It is regrettable that in different kinds of experiments scientists often do not determine the life expectancy of model animals and compare it to control group. This is because the grants are provided for specific studies of various treatments and there is no money for studies of lifespan duration.
It is obvious that such a simple experiment as studies of the drug combination effects on the life expectancy could be carried out back in the 70s. This did not happen as the opinion of a small number of scientists who studied aging was not taken into account. Moreover, some of the science officials have stated that it is immoral to prolong life.
Actually the situation is reversed. To fight against aging is primarily an ethical choice. If human life is our absolute priority the research of longevity is a choice in favor of the good. Omission is the complicity of evil, death of billions of people. In my opinion, ethical, but not the economic aspect of this issue may become a driving force of anti-aging research.
It seems to me that the discussion about reducing the economic burden on the state with the help of aging research is not as inspiring as the idea of saving a person's life, because a person's life is the highest value.
What could be done today to accelerate research and clinical trials in the field of longevity?
First of all, there is a need for a well-organized conference in the United States, where not only scientific, but social and political aspects of the fight against aging will be discussed. It could serve as a trigger for civic engagement in the fight against aging. We need to convey to society the idea that people's lives depend on the research and funding for longevity studies is extremely low.
Also it is necessary to make a crowdfunding project with a big advertising budget on studies of anti-aging drug combinations. The wrong way is to postulate that we just want to find the anti-aging drug, because it has to be more impressive. One of the reasons to use crowdfunding is that it can alter existing public opinion. Another important reason to use crowdfunding for anti-aging drug study is that many potential anti-aging substances can’t be patented because they have been established for a long time for other uses.
Such projects are already launched but their funding is not satisfactory:
https://tilt-open-8ab279af6b1e.tilt.com/liberate-pharmaceuticals
An exception is the Ice Bucket Challenge, which has raised more than $ 90 million during only one month. The courage and perseverance are required to create something similar in the area of fight against aging.
I suppose that investors and government would be cautious until they understand that public attitude has moved towards the support of longevity studies.
The third thing that has to be done is to publish an article signed by reputable scientists, in which the biological relationship between aging and age-related diseases would be proved.
I think that is the plan of action. A key aspect of success of this approach would be the team, which will work on it."
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