Path: bloom-picayune.mit.edu!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!americast.com!americast.com!americast-post Newsgroups: americast.twt.news From: americast-post@AmeriCast.Com Organization: American Cybercasting Approved: americast-post@AmeriCast.com Subject: Fruit fly tells humans fixed life span a myth Date: Sun, 1 Nov 92 20:06:09 EST Message-ID: \SE A;SCIENCE/HEALTH \SS (WS) \HD Fruit fly tells humans fixed life span a myth \BY ASSOCIATED PRESS There is no universal alarm clock set for the hour of death. Nature may actually slow the lethal process for the oldest of the old, according to laboratory studies on insects. Studies in California using Mediterranean fruit flies and in Minnesota using other fruit flies have shown that, at least in these two species, the rate of mortality slows at the oldest ages and the upper limits of survival may be an unknown. The studies were published in Science. "The pattern that is emerging is that there is no well-defined precise limit on life span," said James Curtsinger, a University of Minnesota researcher who is lead author on the fruit-fly study. "There's not an alarm that goes off and then you drop dead." What the studies suggest, said James R. Carey of the University of California at Davis, is: "You can't say that there is an age out there that nobody can ever obtain. You can't draw a line." Mr. Carey, first author of the study on Medflies, said the two insect studies refute the fixed-life-span theory. Whether the findings can be applied to humans is not known, said Mr. Curtsinger, but it does suggest that the standard ideas about aging and death may be wrong. "The standard gerontology model is that there is a predetermined life span. When you reach that limit you are dead," he said. "For instance, if you're 80, you've got a certain probability of death and there is nothing that anybody can do about it." The insect studies, he said, suggest that nature created no such firm upper limits to aging. Mr. Curtsinger used 6,000 fruit flies in his study, and Mr. Carey used 1.2 million Medflies. Both research teams carefully charted the survival of their insects, from hatching to death, and found the oldest of the old had a slower rate of dying. This article is copyright 1992 The Washington Times. Redistribution to other sites is not permitted except by arrangement with American Cybercasting Corporation. For more information, send-email to usa@AmeriCast.COM