Aging and biological rhythms
By: edited by Harvey V. Samis, Jr., and Salvatore Capobianco.
Contributors: Samis, Harvey V.; Capobianco, Salvatore.; Eckerd College. Gerontology Center.; Geriatric Research, Education and Clinical Center.
Series: Advances in experimental medicine and biology ;; v. 108
Publisher: Plenum Press
Published: 1978
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 342
Subjects: Aging -- Congresses; Biological rhythms -- Congresses
Description: Aging is one of the most serious and costly health problems in the Western world. A disproportionate amount of the available health care capability is devoted to the health care of the aged and the cost of this care is soaring. Viewed in wide perspective, aging presents two problems for the researcher's consideration. First is that of providing the most efficacious therapeutic regimens and the best possible care for those already in their latter years. The second is to determine the cause or causes for senescence and all its attendant problems in order to decrease the impact of senescence on general health and well being. This volume is aimed at examining possible relationships between biological time structure and aging and ways by which these interrelationships might be examined in terms of both the causes of senescence and the management of health problems of the elderly.

The purpose of the volume is to stir the interests of chronobiologists in gerontology and those of gerontologists and geriatricians in chronobiology. It is indisputable, in our judgment, that biological time structure is a mutable dimension of biological organization with adaptive capability which is endogenously derived and exogenously cued. Its effects extend from the level of the cell to the interactions of the organism with its environment. Its characteristics affect an organism's response to stress and environmental insults as well as to remedial intervention. It is a dimension of organization whose properties and susceptibility to change have been largely ignored in the context of aging. The contributors of this volume have approached the problem from vastly different points of view. Some have focused on cellular mechanisms; others on integrated systems and total organism effects.

Some have stressed the effects of advancing age on time structure; others have concentrated on possible ways by which deterioration in time structure might be translated and amplified to affect deterioration in functional potential. They have probed for new approaches and suggested modes of attack. They have laid the foundation for a new area of gerontological research which may be called chronogerontology.
Notes: Includes bibliographies and index.
"Based on a conference sponsored by Eckerd College Gerontology Center, St. Petersburg, Florida and the Geriatric Research, Education and Clinical Center, Veterans Administration Center, Bay Pines, Florida held on April 13, 14 and 15, 1977."