**1. Factors Influencing Longevity:**
– Genetics and lifestyle are the main factors influencing longevity.
– Twin studies suggest 20-30% of human lifespan variation is genetic.
– Over 200 gene variants are linked to longevity.
– Centenarians show higher DNA repair protein activity.
– PARP gene expression may contribute to centenarians’ longevity.
– Healthspan, parental lifespan, and longevity are genetically correlated.
– Longevity responds to physical exercise, diet, living conditions, and interventions.
– Leisure time physical exercise can extend life expectancy by up to 4.5 years.
– No clinical evidence supports dietary practices for longevity.
– Biological pathways like Insulin/IGF-1 and AMPK influence aging.
– Autophagy plays a key role in healthspan and lifespan extension.
**2. Historical and Cultural Aspects of Longevity:**
– Preindustrial factors like disease and malnutrition led to higher mortality.
– Deaths from childbirth and infancy were common.
– Examples of individuals living past 85 years in pre-20th-century exist.
– Untreatable health problems often caused quick deaths in old age.
– Genealogists can find ancestors living to their 70s, 80s, and 90s centuries ago.
– Longevity myths involve traditions about long-lived individuals.
– Scientific evidence often does not support claimed ages.
– Longevity claims can be categorized into four groups.
– Some traditions believed to confer longevity include alchemy and specific diets.
– Chuan xiong in China and Taoist practices offer insights into longevity traditions.
**3. Longevity in Different Species:**
– Most organisms have limited longevity due to aging.
– Different species have varying potentials for longevity.
– Longevity in animals can provide insights into human life expectancy.
– Genetic changes can significantly impact aging.
– Some animals have dramatically different lifespans within related species.
– Certain organisms exhibit negligible senescence or aging.
– Oldest known living non-clonal tree is 5,073 years old.
– Methuselah, a bristlecone pine, is 4,800 years old.
– Quahog clam holds the record for longest-lived animal at 507 years.
– Bowhead whale was found to be 211 years old.
– Bacteria possibly revived after 250 million years.
**4. Research and Studies on Longevity:**
– Multivariate genomic scan implicating novel loci in human aging.
– Lessons from centenarians on genetics, lifestyle, and longevity.
– Genetics of human longevity and its complexity.
– Impact of autophagy on maximizing longevity and healthspan.
– Leisure time physical activity of moderate to vigorous intensity and mortality.
– Separating fact from fiction in antiaging diets.
– Importance of autophagy in promoting longevity.
– Health disparities between men and women.
– Arguments on living beyond age 75 for wisdom and societal benefits.
– Bioethical considerations on longevity and aging.
**5. Longevity Records and Long-lived Individuals:**
– Eilif Philipsen, Geert Adriaans Boomgaard, Margaret Ann Neve, Jeanne Calment, Sarah Knauss.
– CIA World Factbook as a source for life expectancy data.
– Tracking the oldest people in the world by Smithsonian.
– Database of human genetic variants associated with longevity.
– Study on the growth of high ages in England and Wales.
– Research on blood iron levels and aging.
– Artificial animal longevity extension through gene editing techniques.
– Disputed longevity claim of Jeanne Calment in 2018.
– Investigation into Calment’s record by Valery Novoselov.
– Research on mortality trajectories of supercentenarians.
Longevity may refer to especially long-lived members of a population, whereas life expectancy is defined statistically as the average number of years remaining at a given age. For example, a population's life expectancy at birth is the same as the average age at death for all people born in the same year (in the case of cohorts).
Longevity studies may involve putative methods to extend life. Longevity has been a topic not only for the scientific community but also for writers of travel, science fiction, and utopian novels. The legendary fountain of youth appeared in the work of the Ancient Greek historian Herodotus.
There are difficulties in authenticating the longest human life span, owing to inaccurate or incomplete birth statistics. Fiction, legend, and folklore have proposed or claimed life spans in the past or future vastly longer than those verified by modern standards, and longevity narratives and unverified longevity claims frequently speak of their existence in the present.
A life annuity is a form of longevity insurance.