The renowned biochemist Vladimir Skulachev gave a lecture in Yekaterinburg about how octopuses and rodents helped scientists almost solve the problem of death.
Is a chemical named after you? But named after Vladimir Petrovich. Although this is still a very big question, who is more fortunate here - the Skulachev ion compound or Skulachev himself. But this is not the point now.
On February 8, the day of Russian science, the Demidov Readings were held in Yekaterinburg. The most cited biologist in Russia, Vladimir Skulachev, became the "headliner" of the action. He gave a lecture on how science can significantly prolong human life. The journalists were lucky enough to visit it. We present the most interesting excerpts from Vladimir Petrovich's speech.
WHEN DID THE SCIENTISTS UNDERSTAND THAT IT IS POSSIBLE TO "CANCEL" OLD AGING?
“The idea of abolishing old age was put forward in 1881 by the great German biologist August Weismann. He said: "I see death not as a primary necessity, but as something acquired a second time in the process of adaptation." That is, it was about the fact that biological evolution for some reason invented death. And once it was not. Weismann was immediately accused of anti-Darwinism. Death is a counterproductive trait for the organism, and contemporaries could not understand how such a trait could be selected by Darwinian natural selection. At the end of his life, blinded by glaucoma, Weismann abandoned his point of view, which was triumphantly received by his numerous opponents. But in the second half of the 20th century, the scientific community changed its point of view, as the phenomenon of apoptosis was discovered."
Male Australian marsupials are programmed to die after the spring rut. Photo: from the site australia-tour.info
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ALL CELLS ARE AFRAID OF APOPTOSIS! BTW, WHAT IS IT?
“Apoptosis is nothing more than the programmed death of a living cell. Each of our cells has a gene that specifically organizes a chain of events leading to its rapid and inevitable death. However, some unicellular creatures have a very similar suicide system. That is, it was probably invented a long time ago, since even such simple life forms as bacteria have it. This sharply aroused interest in what Weisman was talking about. Scientists began to look for examples when not a single-celled creature, but a complex form of life dies not because it got sick, but because this deadly program was turned on."
IS THE OCTOPUS PROGRAMMED FOR DEATH?
“It turned out that the spotted octopus has an inherent suicide program. It is purely biochemical, encoded in the genes. The trick is that the female of this species lives only as long as she protects the clutch of eggs from predators. As soon as the little octopuses hatch, her mouth sticks together and she starves to death. It turned out that it is possible to interrupt this chain of events if one of the glands is removed. Then the mouth no longer overgrows, and the female octopus can bear offspring more than once. Another example of programmed death occurs in the Australian marsupial mouse. After the spring rut, regardless of whether the male managed to mate or not, he dies, poisoned by his own pheromones.
Scientists were able to defeat the programmed death of some species of octopus. Photo: MIKHAIL FROLOV / kp.ru
HACKNEM AGING
“There are two hypotheses about what aging is - pessimistic and optimistic. Pessimistic implies that aging is the accumulation of accidental breakdowns in the body. There is nothing we can do about it. And the optimistic hypothesis implies that old age is the last stage of the programmed development of the body. It, like any program, can be "hacked", that is, hacked. Biologists can do it."
The chemical compound Skulachev's ions is named after Vladimir Skulachev. Photo: ALEXEY BULATOV / kp.ru
WHAT ARE WE Worse than Bees?
“Aging is needed to increase the pressure of natural selection. The poet-fabulist Aesop once said: "The hare will always run away from the fox, because for him it is a matter of life and death, and for her it is a matter of dinner." But only a young hare with useful traits will run away, which will then be transferred to the offspring. But it follows from this that if a species has risen to such a high level of development that it has already left the process of natural selection, then aging should also disappear, since it is no longer needed. And such a phenomenon - the absence of aging - can be found in creatures that live in colonies and in which only the reigning couple reproduce. These are bees, ants and naked mole rats.
WHAT ARE DIGGERS?
“Naked mole rats are small bald rodents. They live in the ground, make labyrinths in it the size of two football fields. In the center of the labyrinth the queen sits with her husband, and up to 300 servants are running around. Only the queen reproduces with her husband. And it turns out that she can live and rule for up to 30 years. This is an absolutely incredible figure. A close relative of the mole rat, the mouse, lives for only 2.5 years and dies of old age. But the queen of the naked mole rat had no signs of old age that would lead to death.
Naked mole rat queens can live for more than 30 years, while their closest relatives, mice, die of old age in just 2.5 years.
DIGGER WE COMRADE?
“In the case of the naked mole rat, we are faced with the phenomenon of neoteny. This is a slowdown in individual development. It was described over 100 years ago. In short, somewhere in the body there is a large biological clock that sets the pace of our development. And to overcome old age, we must slow down these hours. Humans as well as naked mole rats have escaped from the pressure of natural selection. It took a naked mole rat 30 million years to defeat old age. But we cannot wait that long. We assumed that aging in our body is due to toxic forms of oxygen, which we ourselves form. This "poison" is formed inside mitochondria in cells, organelles associated with respiration. And we have synthesized the strongest antioxidant that is able to stop the programmed death of a living cell. They tested it on mice and doubled their lifespan.
GIVE TWO
“We have already switched to people. Created drops that help to overcome senile eye diseases - cataracts, glaucoma. There is already a huge therapeutic effect, more than a million bottles have been sold. We also made an ointment that accelerates the healing of wounds and burns in old people seven times. In addition, we have created a real cure for old age. In a couple of years it will be possible to buy it in pharmacies. I myself already accept it, I have the right to do so, as an inventor. Now I am 83 years old, but I feel pretty good. I began to see youth dreams, increased efficiency"
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Vladimir Petrovich Skulachev was born on February 21, 1935 in Moscow. Soviet and Russian biochemist, academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences, doctor of biological sciences. Graduated from the Faculty of Biology and Soil Science of Moscow State University (1957), where he has been working since 1960. In 1965-1973 - Head of the Department of Bioenergy of the Interfaculty Laboratory of Bioorganic Chemistry, since 1973 Head of the Laboratory of Bioorganic Chemistry. Director of the Institute of Physical and Chemical Biology named after Belozersky. On November 26, 1974, he became a corresponding member of the USSR Academy of Sciences in the Department of Biochemistry, Biophysics and Chemistry of Physiologically Active Compounds. Since December 15, 1990 - Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences in the Department of Biochemistry, Biophysics and Chemistry of Physiologically Active Compounds. In 2002, he founded the Faculty of Bioengineering and Bioinformatics at Moscow State University and is its dean to this day. In March 2017, he became a member of the Public Chamber of the Russian Federation.
Member of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences, member of the European Academy, president of the club of Russian members of the European Academy, president of the All-Russian Biochemical Society, chairman of the bioenergy organization of Russia, full member of the Academy of Creativity; Doctor honoris causa of Vilnius University.
He is widely known for his research, publications and public speeches aimed at defeating the aging of the human body.
Danil Svechkov
