The long awaited news is finally here. People can now have better life to live hundreds of years longer. Not only that, cancer tooo might be no longer unbeatable. By unlocking more and more secrets of how our DNA and its components work, scientists are becoming more enthusiastic than ever. They now believe that aging can be slowed down or rversed through manipulating the length of telomere, the antidote for cancer may lie in activating telomerase, and chronic age-related dideases can be kissed goodbye very soon. Until recently the aging process was thought as inevitable; there was no way to slow it down let alone reverse it. But recent scietific breakthrough has revealed many secrets. Telomere, a region of repetitive nucleotide sequences located at the tips of chromosomes, is meant to protect DNA integrity and allow proper cellular division wity any loss of genetic information. Telomere is easier to imagine as plastic cap at the end of shoe laces, which is crucial to prevent fine strands from unraveling and from getting entangled with one another. With each cell division, however, Telomere progressively shortens until it reaches to a minimal length at which cell is no longer able to proliferate. At this stage the cell is said to have reached ti its hayflick Limit. It will then either die, senesce, or somehow (in an abnormal way) escape he usual fate and keep replicating. It has a big implication to determine whether the uncontrolled cellular proliferation lead to malignancy. By understanding the funtion of Telomere and it limits the lifespan of a cell, the aging process has become much clearer. In fact the 'telomere' phenomenon is now believed to be the main cause of aging, beside oxidative stress and other external factors. Siince cellular death or its failure to further divide means the beginning of deterioration of various bodily functions, it also indicates aging. Numerous studies have shown a strong link between telomeric DNA logetivity. Longer telomers are found in those with longer lifespan, while shorter ones are associated with early or premature death. Not only thast, scietists now believe that long telomeres may a factor contributing to better health (or are cause of it) Courtsy (www.onislam.net)
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