Research Into Process Of Growing Old

Press, Volume XCIII, Issue 27987, 6 June 1956, Page 9

Research Into Process Of Growing Old

(From a Reuter Correspondent)

BASLE. Special teams of men and women are to act as human guinea pigs to help in the development of the comparatively new science of gerontology —the investigation of phenomena in the process of ageing. Announcing the formation of this special group of volunteers. Professor F. Verzar. of Basle University, recently summed up the work of an international conference, held in Basle, which grouped together leadinggerontological scientists from Britain. France, West Germany, Italy. Holland, Hungary, Belgium and Switzerland. Professor Verzar said that hitherto almost all gerontological experiments in the past have been carried out with animals, particularly rats. But the question which naturally interested the world most was how and whv man himself aged. "Much has already been accomplished in this connexion in the past by comparing functions in old and young subjects.” he said. “What has hardly ever been done as yet, however, is to follow up the process of ageing in one person for years and decades. “A research team in Basle, using the most modern medico-biological methods, has now embarked on a systematic study of the changes recorded from year to year in the eyes, lungs and circulatory organs of a series of volunteers.

“In this way, one should be able in time to obtain an exact picture of the ageing process in each individual case.”

Professor Verzar explained that only when it was known when and how the various groups of organs aged and how they were affected by such factors as heredity, environmental influences, or diseases, would it be possible to set about attempting to influence the course of this ageing process.

He said that lectures delivered during the Basle conference on experimental research on ageing had ahed a great deal of fresh light on the changes undergone by elastic and connective tissues. These finding* might, perhaps, enable scientists at some Lime in the future to understand the rheumatic diseases and the affections of the joints encountered in elderly subjects. The conference also discussed the harmful influence of fat-accumulation and over-feeding on the life span, as well as problems concerning the toxic effects of metabolism.

"Of particular interest were the reports dealing with research on the changes occurring in the brain and sensory organs, Professor Verzar said, “since it is to be hoped that such studies may eventually make it possible to intervene to good in this sphere as well.”. Professor Verzar emphasised that experimental research on ageing wai at present still only a purely theoretical form of preliminary research and. as such, had a long way to go before it could yield practical results. It was obviously impossible to advance beyond the merely empirical plane to a rational and scientific treatment of the physical and mental complications of old age. he declared, until there were clearer notions a* to what was actually meant by

“ageing.” It had been said with truth that the process of ageing started at birth, he continued, and throughout man's life changes were constantly taking place. “Why, then, this experimental research on ageing?” Professor Verzar concluded. “Its object is not to prevent the inevitable but to acquire that fundamental knowledge which may later help us to overcome the symptoms of ageing and enable older people, as far as possible, to retain their capacity for work.”