Is there a limit to human lifespan?

Speaking of life span, what most people think about is longevity or even immortality. From ancient times to the present, from emperors to ordinary people, longevity has become the dream and pursuit of many people!

However, ideals are full and reality is skinny. The latest Nature found that the average maximum human lifespan is 115 years, and the upper limit is around 125.

The data in this article show

The increase in lifespan is not linear

When the researchers looked at the improvements in survival for people aged 100 and older since 1900, they found that regardless of the year a person was born, the improvements peaked around age 100 and then declined rapidly. "This finding suggests that the effectiveness of reducing mortality in old age is decreasing and that there may be a limit to the human lifespan," said Dr. Vijg.

The International Database on Longevity has a 'maximum reported age at death', which is the number of people who lived to 110 years or older between 1968 and 2006.

The age at death of these supercentenarians increased rapidly between the 1970s and the early 1990s, but peaked around 1995 -- further evidence that there is a limit to human lifespan. The researchers noted that this peak occurred close to 1997, the year of the death of 122-year-old Frenchwoman Jeanne Calment, the oldest person ever recorded.

This graph shows that the maximum lifespan of humans has stagnated

Relationship between calendar year and the age that experiences the most rapid gains in survival over the past 100 years. The age with most rapid gains has increased over the century, but its rise has been slowing and it appears to have reached a plateau.

In other words, humans cannot live indefinitely.

No matter how much we fight infectious diseases and chronic diseases, we are only increasing the average life expectancy, but there is a limit!

This is Emma Morano, the oldest person alive at 116 years old

This requires us to review our previous theories of life span.

————Two numbers, two theories————

Some people have estimated that the maximum lifespan of humans is 120, while others have estimated that it is 150.

There are two main theories about the current limit of human lifespan: one is the sexual maturity theory, and the other is the Hayflick limit.

The theory of sexual maturity is a statistical inference that states that the limit of human lifespan is 8-10 times that of sexual maturity (in mammals).

The Hayflick limit is the result of an in vitro cell experiment, which states that cultured human cells can only divide for 50 generations. After 50 generations, the cells will age and die, no matter what method is used [2]. I have tried this theory before. The normal cell lines we commonly use in research, including IMR90, WI38, etc., have a lifespan of about 60 generations. At that generation, the cells will stop dividing and quietly wait to die.

Based on these theories, it is speculated that the limit of human life span is around 120-150 years, and the life span will only be fine-tuned in the future.

But most people do not live beyond this age because of a large number of diseases that cause us to die prematurely.

However, the reality tells us that it is between 115-125.

I have thought of many ways to extend my lifespan (note, not the lifespan limit, there is currently no evidence that anyone has exceeded the lifespan limit)

Primary: blood transfusion, which has been proven to be feasible (it is unlikely to break the lifespan limit, but it can lead to healthy aging)

Intermediate: Organ replacement, many people die because some of their organs are damaged

There are two technologies currently:

1. Xenotransplantation

2. Human-animal embryo technology

Advanced: Biological alternatives, such as stem cells (stem cells and telomeres can cause cancer, which is currently difficult to solve)

This is somewhat similar to the human-animal embryo, but not exactly the same.

At present, the above three types are expected to be realized in the future, or at least they are being studied by many people now.

To sum up, with the development and progress of science and technology, it is not impossible to break the limit of human life span!