In 1952, Nobel laureate Dr. Peter Medawar hypothesized that aging processes might be the result of evolutionary natural selection having little to say about people. over the childbearing age.
New study finds new support for Medawar’s hypothesis in an analysis of how around 20,000 human genes are expressedSource of trust as we age.
The study suggests that our genes have less influence as we age.
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The study’s lead author, Dr. Peter Sudmant, an assistant professor of integrative biology at the University of California, Berkeley, says Berkeley News“Almost all common human diseases are diseases of aging: Alzheimer’s, cancers, heart disease, diabetes.”
“Massive amounts of public resources have been devoted to identifying the genetic variants that predispose you to these diseases. What our study shows is that in fact, as you age, genes have less importance for the expression of your genes,” says Sudmant.
“Genes that are activated when we are young are more evolutionarily limited because they are essential for our survival and reproduction, while genes expressed after reaching reproductive age are under less evolutionary pressure.”
This is an excerpt. Read the full article here