The Fundamentals of Cancer
Cancer, we now know, is a disease caused by the uncontrolled growth of a single cell. This growth is unleashed by mutations—changes in DNA that specifically affect genes that incite unlimited cell growth. In a normal cell, powerful genetic circuits regulate cell division and cell death. In a cancer cell, these circuits have been broken, unleashing a cell that cannot stop growing.
That this seemingly simple mechanism—cell growth without barriers—can lie at the heart of this grotesque an...
notesIt is a mutated cell, a renegade, the key is to keep it from mutating.
Cancer as a Microevolutionary Process
The body of an animal operates as a society or ecosystem whose individual members are cells, reproducing by cell division and organized into collaborative assemblies or tissues. In our earlier discussion of the maintenance of tissues (Chapter 22), our interests were similar to those of the
ecologist: cell births, deaths, habitats, territorial limitations, and the maintenance of population sizes. The one ecological topic conspicuously absent was that of natural selection: we said nothing of co... notesCancer evolves within us, growing by natural selection in rebellion against the environment of our body's ecosystem.
The answer lies in the cancer
Most cancers are the result of "immortal" cells that have ways of evading this programmed destruction of telomere. Cancer cells use every trick in the book to gain immortality. One of their cleverer maneuvers is to keep the little caps, called telomeres, at the end of their chromosomes long. As a normal cell divides, its telomeres gradually erode, eventually becoming so short and dysfunctional that the cell is marked for death. As harsh as this may sound, it's exactly what should happen; elim...Man has always longed to live forever. He has continually pushed the frontiers of science in his attempt to reach this goal.Immortality is the ultimate quest for redemption in humanity. Its universal application transcends time, space, and culture appearing in stories from the Epic of Gilgamesh composed some 4000 plus years ago, to novels of the twenty first century
If you are in good health,you can live to 120 years but not much longer,because at age 120 you reach the hayflick limit -maximum times a cell can divide and make new cells.
Telomere, which protects the end of the chromosome from deterioration, is thought to be the "clock of aging" contained within the human body. Many scientists believe that the limit on lifespan and decline in health is imposed by the gradual shortening of our telomeres that occurs with every cell division. It has been repeatedly demonstrated that a human cell that does not undergo telomere shortening will divide indefinitely and is, by all available measurements, immortal.
Now researchers have discovered the first compound that activates telomerase – an enzyme that lengthens telomeres – in the human body, potentially opening the door to arresting or even reversing the aging process. Human cells can keep living and dividing indefinitely when telomerase is continually present; i.e. the cells become immortal
A natural product derived nutraceutical known as TA-65, was shown to lengthen the shortest telomeres in humans, potentially extending human lifespan and healthspan. Telomerase activation is thought to be a keystone of future regenerative medicine and a necessary condition for clinical immortality. Although TA-65 is probably too weak to completely arrest the aging process, it is the first telomerase activator recognized as safe for human use.
