• Question: if you put a 18year old man's DNA in a 50 year old man, will the 50 year old man's life span increase?

    Asked by lozza to Carolyn, Peter, Richard, Sara on 19 Nov 2015.
    • Photo: Sara Falcone

      Sara Falcone answered on 19 Nov 2015:

      Hello 🙂

      Your theory are reasoning is very interesting. Even if as a principle it makes sense it is not something you can do, but if you could it would cause more problems than benefits.

    • Photo: Richard Unwin

      Richard Unwin answered on 20 Nov 2015:

      That’s a really interesting question. Even if it were possible it might cause other problems – would the 50years old man just ‘become’ the 18yo as his genes take over? What is REALLY interesting is that people have done experiments where they’ve taken an old mouse and replaced it’s blood with that of a young mouse, and the old mouse becomes young again (more active, better memory and learning, lives linger). So your idea is a good one. Not sure if this will ever work for (or even be allowed in) people, but it has triggered a load of research looking for the specific ingredient’s in the blood that are responsible.

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