Chance, Development, and Aging by Caleb Ellicott Finch, Thomas Kirkwood, Thomas Kirkwood, T. B. Kirkwood
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Product Details
- Pub. Date: January 1900
- Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
- Format: Hardcover, 278pp
- ISBN-13: 9780195133615
- ISBN: 0195133617
- Edition Number: 1
Synopsis
In Chance, Development, and Aging, two leading biological gerontologists review and evaluate all of the available data to elucidate the respective roles played by genes and chance developmental events in determining the course of aging in individuals. The combination of genetic and external environmental influences provides only an incomplete answer. Inbred laboratory animals, for example, exhibit a wide range of life spans despite having nearly identical genes and environments. Similarly, uncovering the genetic risks for Alzheimer's disease has not enabled doctors to predict with confidence its onset and severity. This book argues that understanding chance events, specifically random variations during prenatal development, is essential for answering these questions. The book draws on the extensive research in developmental biology on random variations in form and function, while putting this research in a new context. The discussion sheds light on a range of questions, from understanding menopause to explaining why identical twins are not truly identical. The book will be invaluable for gerontologists, geneticists, developmental and reproductive biologists, physiologists, and a broad range of physicians and investigators in experimental medicine.
Annotation
The book contains black-and-white illustrations.
Michael Cummings
Theories of aging are usually centered on genes and gene products, with environmental factors playing important but secondary roles. Factors such as DNA repair, the control of free-radicals, and cell replacement are the focus of many research projects in this field. In this well-documented monograph, two leaders in the field of aging research consider another possibility: the role of stochastic factors, including chance in the aging process. The purpose is to present the role of stochastic factors on theories of aging. This book is intended for those scientists working in development, as well as aging, studies. In five fully-developed chapters, the authors sketch out ideas on the role of chance in aging, focusing on events in the development and aging of the reproductive system. With this foundation established, they move their discussion to consider intrinsic variation in cell fate during development, ending with a chapter on the role of chance in the developmental environment. While chance is recognized and incorporated into studies of populations and their evolution, its application to aging as a developmental process is new. The role of chance is presented here as a coherent set of ideas that set the stage for new experimental approaches to aging at the molecular and cellular level. The implications of this idea are not trivial, and this book should be of interest to those working on development as well as aging, since many of the ideas apply to developmental outcomes beginning with gamete formation, as well as the aging of the organism.
More Reviews and RecommendationsBiography
Dr. Caleb E. Finch is ARCO and William Kieschnick Professor of Gerontology at the Andrus Gerontology Center, University of Southern California. Dr. Tom Kirkwood is a Professor at the University of Manchester and the Director of the Joint Center on Aging at the Universities of Manchester and Newcastle.
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