Evening star., 1921-08-07
Old Age Preventable.

Following hard on the heels of
BernanS Shaw's Back to Methu-
selah." the idea of which is that hu-
and grow wiser if civilization is to
improve. the eminent French biolo-
gist, DR.. Carrel. now declares that
that old age is nothing but a pre-
Nentable disease" and that there is
no biological reason why people
should not live forever.
The Paris Matin. which gives an ac-
count of DIR. Carrel's theory. goes into
some detail as to the beginnings
of the research and the data on which
DIR. Carers conclusions are based.
1t ..TSs says: svsr.ss duration of ,un.n =
life is less than fifty years. the num-
ber of proved centenarians is very
low, and it is almost certain that no
human being in modern times lived
beyond 120 years. That seems to
be the rigid limit of human longevity.
And yet, according to discoveries
recently made at the Rockefeller In
stitute. there is no reason why this
should be so. since the tissues OF the
body are proved 10 be immortal
The first idea for this re-
physiologist Loeb. who succeeded in
Matching a number of unfertilized
frogs eggs. That led him to study
the cellular life of the frog itself.
and he succeeded in keeping sew
eral fragments of the animals tis-
sue alive outside the body for con-
siderable periods of time. o.,
shortly after, DIR. w. H. Lewis of
Baltimore and his wife discovered
that the tissues of an embryo chick
en- could be kept alive outside the
organism. in completely inorganic
solutions tsuch as hypochlorite of
soda, Ringers solution. etcD. But
DIR. Harrison remarked at that time
that tissue-culture proved nothing. SO
long as life was not maintained for
a period superior to the normal life
of the animal itself.
1T remained for our compatriot DIR.
Carrel. and his collaborators to meet
this objection through a demonstra-
ton that has now been completed.
"Dr. Carrel began his experiments
fragments Of the heart and blood YES
sells of a chicken embryo eight days
old BY March only five of the fras-
ments were still alive. In the follow
ing months these cultures (Which
might have been more numerous IN
dents and bacterial infection. so that
on September 25 only one remained.
.sThis was a fragment of conJunc-
tive tissue derived indirectly from the
fragment of heart, which, according
to DR.. Ebling (who followed Carrel In
, these experiments) was still beat
ing after 140 days of life outside the
organism" This culture has been
growing vigorously ever since Every
forty-eight hours IL is divided into
four parts. which are carefully
washed in Ringers solution and
placed separately on fresh glass cul-
ture plates, which are kept at tenn
nerature of 80 centigrade G02 FD.
THE culture substance used con-
sists of equal parts of chicken
plasma (extracted from the blood OF
an adult chicken) and liquid extract
of chicken embyro.
Various calculations show that the
surface of the tissue under cultiva-
tion increases from four to forty
times in the course OF forty-eteht
hours. It is now certain that tissue
cultivated outside the organism can
live much longer than the animal
itself and indeed for an almost in
DEFINITE period Moreover. it is shown
that the vitality Of these tissues. and
particularly their growing CAPACITY.
is as great, If not greater than. five
years ago.
"Furthermore, striking anology
is shown between the development OF
tissues outside the organism and the
growth of cancerous tissue.
However that may be. il is proved
heyond doubt that the tissues of
which we are made are practically
immortal. Thus old age is. as Dastre
guessed, nothing but a disease. III
the cells and tissues of the old change
and weaken, it is not the cause. but
the result, Of old age"