The biology of aging: 1985-2010 and beyond

Abstract

In this contribution to the series of reflective essays celebrating the 25th anniversary of The FASEB Journal, our task is to assess the growth of research on the biology of aging during this period and to suggest where we might be heading during the next 25 yr. A review of the literature suggests a healthy acceleration of progress during the past decade, perhaps largely due to progress on the genetics of longevity of model organisms. Progress on the genetics of health span in these model organisms has lagged, however. Research on the genetic basis of the remarkable interspecific variations in life span has only recently begun to be seriously addressed. The spectacular advances in genomics should greatly accelerate progress. Research on environmental effects on life span and health span needs to be accelerated. Stochastic variations in gene expression in aging have only recently been addressed. These can lead to random departures from homeostasis during aging.-Martin, G. M. The biology of aging: 1985-2010 and beyond.

Figure 1.

Factor increase (normalized relative to 1985) of PubMed publications with MeSH search word “aging” in either selected high-impact journals (Science, Nature, Cell, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA, and FASEB Journal; solid red line) or in all PubMed journals (dashed red line). For comparison, the factor increase in PubMed publications (relative to 1985) is shown for the MeSH search words “congenital abnormalities” (CA) either in selected high-impact journals (above; solid black line) or in all PubMed journals (black dotted line). The rate of increase for aging publications in the selected journals is greater than that for aging publications among all PubMed journals by a highly significant factor of 3.3 (P<1E-10). The rate of increase of aging publications among the selected journals is significantly different from that for CA publications in these journals (P=2E-10). After 1997, the rate of increase of CA publications in these selected journals is not significantly different from 0 (P=0.27). The rate of increase in citations for “aging” among all PubMed journals is not significantly different compared to the rate of increase of citations for CA in all PubMed journals (P=0.07). Methods: comparison of rates of change in publication rates over time was done with simple linear regression and a linear spline with one change point at 1996. The lowess smoother was used to produce smooth functions using the R statistical package (http://www.r-project.org).