Our bodies are quite miraculous machines. We are born with a genome that contains the code for every protein necessary for survival. We develop and produce hormones that allow us to reproduce and have children. But what happens to us as we age? This question has puzzled scientists for years while they offer theory after theory.

In 1957, evolutionary biologist George Williams proposed what he called the antagonistic pleiotropy hypothesis as a theory of how and why we age. He claimed that our bodies express a gene that has benefits for our early life, but that same gene will harm us later on. His hypothesis has inspired aging research and led to a story about a chemical discovered deep within the dirt of an island floating in the Pacific.

In 1964, Canadian researchers, led by Stanley Skoryna from McGill University, set sail out of Halifax for Easter Island—a speck of land floating 2,000 miles off the coast of Chile, where the human population is small but life is diverse. They were hoping to retrieve precious specimens from the island before its land was tarnished with the building of a new airport. Stanley and his team collected hundreds of plant samples, countless animal specimens, and took blood and saliva from all 949 of the island’s residents.

What they found buried in the dirt on Easter Island would turn out to be the biggest treasure of all: a bacteria that would mystify scientists for the next 50 years. This bacteria was found to create a chemical now known as rapamycin, cleverly named after Easter Island’s native name, Rapa Nui.

Read the full article: https://www.impactjournals.com/journals/blog/aging/rapamycin-miracle-chemical-discovered-easter-islands-dirt/

About Aging

Launched in 2009, Aging publishes papers of general interest and biological significance in all fields of aging research and age-related diseases, including cancer—and now, with a special focus on COVID-19 vulnerability as an age-dependent syndrome. Topics in Aging go beyond traditional gerontology, including, but not limited to, cellular and molecular biology, human age-related diseases, pathology in model organisms, signal transduction pathways (e.g., p53, sirtuins, and PI-3K/AKT/mTOR, among others), and approaches to modulating these signaling pathways.

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