![Secrets of Eternity in the Blood of a 115-Year-Old Woman?](https://img.passeportsante.net/1000x526/2014-04-29/i26200-les-secrets-de-l-eternite-dans-le-sang-d-une-femme-de-115-ans.jpg)
Scientists have long sought to unravel the mystery of eternal life. If the research so far has led to very hypothetical conclusions, it could well take a new turn. A team of researchers believe they have discovered one of the keys to shortness of life in the blood of a 115-year-old woman.
In 2005, a 115-year-old Dutchwoman, Hendrikje van Andel-Schipper, passed away after agreeing to donate her body to science thirty years earlier. A godsend for geneticists who have the idea of analyzing the blood of this centenary with impeccable medical check-ups. The idea was to follow the evolution of blood cells over the last thirty years to understand the mechanisms of aging. Nine years later, the researchers finally reveal the conclusions of this study, made fascinating by the excellent state of health of the Dutch.
2 in 1,300 stem cells
The least we can say is that the body of this supercentenary has kept its promises. The blood sample taken after his death only showed two cells responsible for regenerating other blood cells (stem cells). Normally, humans have nearly 1300, all of which are busy renewing our blood! A situation that did not fail to react Henne Holstege, geneticist who took part in the study: “At the beginning, I did not believe it. I told myself that we had made a mistake. It was not possible that a person was still alive with just two active stem cells. Yet after several verifications, the researchers were forced to admit the facts. This peculiarity probably caused his death.
Telomeres: biological clocks?
To explain the loss of blood stem cells, researchers favor the theory of telomeres. These DNA segments, located at the ends of chromosomes, shorten over cell divisions until they reach a critical size that triggers the mechanism of cell death. However, the Dutch researchers noticed that the telomeres of the 2 remaining stem cells were tiny. It is therefore a safe bet that the other stem cells ended up wasting away due to this phenomenon. If this theory is correct, and given the excellent health of Hendrikje van Andel-Schipper, it would be possible to prolong life by implanting young stem cells in the blood (taken for example at birth). The findings of this study are attractive, but much more research is needed to corroborate these hypotheses. Next step: dissecting the Dutch genome to understand she was able to escape degenerative diseases …