Lifeboat Foundation: Safeguarding Humanity
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Category: life extension

I’m excited to see I’m the fourth most searched 3rd party presidential candidate. Thanks for your support of a science, longevity, and technology platform as an alternative to the establishment. If this continues a nonreligious transhumanist could end up #4 or #5 in the final elections, and even get enough votes (maybe a million or more) to push the US election one way or the other if it’s close.

So much about the 2016 presidential election is unprecedented. But perhaps nothing is more unusual than the electorate’s level of dissatisfaction with both major parties’ likely nominees.

An NBC News-SurveyMonkey poll released earlier this week found that, while Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton maintains her lead in a head-to-head match-up with presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump, neither candidate is popular with the public at large.

Approximately 60 percent of respondents told pollsters that they either “disliked” or “hated” Clinton, while 63 percent felt the same way about Trump.

Pollster Laura Wronski noted that 23 percent of respondents said they disliked or hated both Trump and Clinton.

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May turn out to be the “fountain-of-youth gene,” say researchers.

An atherosclerotic lesion. Such lesions can rupture and cause heart attacks and strokes. (credit: UVA School of Medicine)

University of Virginia School of Medicine have discovered that a gene called Oct4 — which scientific dogma insists is inactive in adults — actually plays a vital role in preventing ruptured atherosclerotic plaques inside blood vessels, the underlying cause of most heart attacks and strokes.

The researchers found that Oct4 controls the conversion of smooth muscle cells into protective fibrous “caps” inside plaques, making the plaques less likely to rupture. They also discovered that the gene promotes many changes in gene expression that are beneficial in stabilizing the plaques. In addition, the researchers believe it may be possible to develop drugs or other therapeutic agents that target the Oct4 pathway as a way to reduce the incidence of heart attacks or stroke.

Could impact many human diseases, regenerative medicine

The researchers are also currently testing Oct4′s possible role in repairing cellular damage and healing wounds, which would make it useful for regenerative medicine.

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The visible impacts of depression and stress that can be seen in a person’s face—and contribute to shorter lives—can also be found in alterations in genetic activity, according to newly published research.

In a series of studies involving both C. elegans worms and human cohorts, researchers from the Indiana University School of Medicine and the Scripps Research Institute have identified a series of genes that may modulate the effects of good or bad mood and response to stress on lifespan. In particular, the research pointed to a gene known as ANK3 as playing a key role in affecting . The research was published May 24, 2016 in the Nature Publishing Group journal Molecular Psychiatry, the top ranked journal in the field of psychiatry.

“We were looking for genes that might be at the interface between mood, stress and longevity”, said Alexander B. Niculescu III, M.D., Ph.D., professor of psychiatry and medical neuroscience at the IU School of Medicine. “We have found a series of genes involved in mood disorders and stress disorders which also seem to be involved in longevity.

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Are you an avid supporter of aging research and a keen longevity activist?
The Biogerontology Research Foundation is offering select summer internships for talented individuals. You’d join a passionate and supportive team in researching diagnostic, prognostic, and therapeutic strategies; advising a panel of investors in developing a roadmap to promote longevity science and related technologies across the globe.

The advertised positions are 3 month internships, with the possibility of continuing afterwards. Free accommodation will be provided for in London, alongside a negotiable salary.

The Biogerontology Research Foundation is a UK based think tank dedicated to aging research and accelerating its application worldwide.

Apply to: [email protected]

Are you an avid supporter of aging research and a keen longevity activist?

The Biogerontology Research Foundation is offering select summer internships for talented individuals. You €™d join a passionate and supportive team in researching diagnostic, prognostic, and therapeutic strategies; advising a panel of investors in developing a roadmap to promote longevity science and related technologies across the globe.

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Oct4, a gene, thought to be inactive in adults, may actually play a vital role in preventing heart attacks and strokes and could also delay some of the effects of ageing, scientists have found. They said the gene could also prove critical in the field of regenerative medicine.

Representative photo.Representative photo.

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Dr. Judith Campisi, a professor at the Buck Institute for Research on Aging, focuses her lecture on senescent cells and their role in cancer and aging. She explains how cancer is an age-related disease by describing the many conditions beyond DNA mutations that must generally be met for a malignant tumor to form. Dr. Campisi acknowledges that while cellular senescence is a powerful anti-cancer mechanism and while senescent cells may even play a key role in wound healing, senescent cells can nonetheless cause inflammation in their local environment and actually support the formation of tumors.

Visit www.sens.org/videos to view the rest of our course lecture videos.

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Crowd funding interventions against aging, an update from lifespan.io

New updates from the MMTP Campaign: a mini-interview with Dr. Joao Pedro de Magalhaes of Liverpool University where he discusses the importance of animal studies, and the release of a short version of the MMTP study proposal to provide more details on the planned experiments. For more information check out the “Updates” tab on the campaign here: https://www.lifespan.io/campaigns/the-major-mouse-testing-program/ #CrowdfundTheCure #LifespanIO

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CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va., May 17, 2016 — A gene that scientific dogma insists is inactive in adults actually plays a vital role in preventing the underlying cause of most heart attacks and strokes, researchers at the University of Virginia School of Medicine have determined. The discovery opens a new avenue for battling those deadly conditions, and it raises the tantalizing prospect that doctors could use the gene to prevent or delay at least some of the effects of aging.

“Finding a way to augment the expression of this gene in adult cells may have profound implications for promoting health and possibly reversing some of the detrimental effects with aging,” said researcher Gary K. Owens, PhD, director of UVA’s Robert M. Berne Cardiovascular Research Center.

Unexpected Protective Effect

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New MMTP Interview on Fightaging! discussing longevity, advocacy and the urgent need to support research!

By way of following on from today’s AMA over at /r/futurology, I recently had the chance to ask a few questions of the Major Mouse Testing Program (MMTP) volunteers, a mix of scientists and advocates who aim to do their part to speed up progress towards effective treatments for the causes of aging. The group formed six months ago or so, and are presently seeking funds for their first mouse studies through crowdfunding with the Lifespan.io organization. The initial focus is on senolytic treatments capable of removing senescent cells from old tissues. I encourage you all to take a look at the details of their research proposal.

Growth in the number of dysfunctional, senescent cells is a contributing cause of degenerative aging, involved in the progression and pathology of all of the common age-related diseases. A growing body of evidence supports the outright removal approach as a way to minimize or eliminate this portion of the aging process. Unfortunately there is — as ever in the aging research field — a paucity of funding and always the need for more and better animal data in order to pull in other players with deep pockets. At this stage in the progression from laboratory to clinic, prior to the involvement of any large institutions or companies, all such efforts are important work. I’m pleased to have been able to contribute to this Major Mouse Testing Program fundraiser, and hope to see great things from this group in the future.

How did the Major Mouse Testing Program come about? How did you meet and what made you decide to undertake this particular project?

Elena: I have been collaborating with the International Longevity Alliance (ILA) for about 3 years. It is an international non-for-profit organization with the head office in Paris, our goal is to support innovative biomedical technologies to address aging. At the beginning, the core team had a lot of discussions with other pro-longevity organizations and with the scientific community to identify the bottlenecks that impede the development of the technologies to slow down, postpone and reverse age-related damage to health. And we learned that one of the barriers was the deficiency in robust animal trials for a long list of promising interventions. Then one of the Founding Board Members, Edouard Debonneuil, came in with the idea that the ILA could start its own fundraising project to support this kind of research. This is how MMTP was started.

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