3 ms·
tl;dr might not be the bottleneck, so the telomere length and shortening rate is measuring something else that is.
by LegitShady 7y ago
tl;dr might not be the bottleneck, so the telomere length and shortening rate is measuring something else that is.
- waterhouse 7y agoIf you do end up with telomeres that shorten very slowly, could there also be pressure to shorten them more quickly, so it really is just a measurement? Hypothesis: telomerase, which fights the shortening, also promotes cancer. I think I've even seen that before. "Some experiments have raised questions on whether telomerase can be used as an anti-aging therapy, namely, the fact that mice with elevated levels of telomerase have higher cancer incidence and hence do not live longer. Telomerase also favors tumorogenesis, which leads to questions about its potential as an anti-aging therapy.[36] On the other hand, one study showed that activating telomerase in cancer-resistant mice by overexpressing its catalytic subunit extended lifespan.[37] A study that focused on Ashkenazi Jews found that long-lived subjects inherited a hyperactive version of telomerase.[38] " https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telomerase https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telomerase Ambiguous.