Meet Our Editorial Board Member Current Stem Cell Research & Therapy, 2017, Vol

Home , Aubrey de Grey, Biogerontology, Ending Aging, Rejuvenation, Rejuvenation Research, SENS Research Foundation

Meet Our Editorial Board Member Current Stem Cell Research & Therapy, 2017, Vol. 12, No. 3 181 Meet Our Editorial Board Member Dr. Aubrey de Grey SENS Research Foundation Mountain View USA

Dr. Aubrey de Grey is a biomedical gerontologist based in Cambridge, UK and Mountain View, California, USA, and is the Chief Science Officer of SENS Research Foundation (SRF), a California-based 501(c)(3) public charity that conducts biomedical research dedicated to combating the aging process. He is also Editor-in-Chief of Rejuvenation Research, the world’s high- est-impact peer-reviewed journal focused on intervention in aging. He grew up in London, UK, and attended Harrow School before doing undergraduate studies at Cambridge starting in 1982. He received his BA and Ph.D. from the University of Cam- bridge, UK in 1985 and 2000 respectively. His original field was computer science, and he did research in the private sector for six years in the area of software verification (the development of programs that identify mistakes in other programs) before switching fields to biogerontology in the mid-1990s. His Ph.D. was awarded via the Special Regulations (a system employed by Cambridge to recognise research performed outside the university system by those who obtained their first degree from Cambridge) for a series of theoretical insights concerning the possible role of mitochondrial mutations in aging, presented in his first book, “The Mitochondrial Free Radical Theory of Aging”, published in 1999. His research interests encompass the characterisation of all the accumulating and eventually pathogenic molecular and cel- lular side-effects of metabolism (“damage”) that constitute mammalian aging and the design of interventions to repair and/or obviate that damage. He has developed a possibly comprehensive plan for such repair, termed Strategies for Engineered Negli- gible Senescence (SENS), which breaks aging down into seven major classes of damage and identifies detailed approaches to addressing each one. These classes are: (1) loss of cells (cell death uncompensated by cell division and differentiation), repaired by stem cell therapy; (2) emergence of division-obsessed cells (cancer), pre-empted by a combination of whole-body interdic- tion of lengthening of telomeres (WILT) and stem cell replenishment to maintain rapidly-renewing tissues; (3) accumulation of toxic death-resistant cells, reversed by suicide gene therapy and possibly immunotherapy; (4) accumulation of mutant mitochondrial DNA, obviated by introduction of suitably modified backup copies of the 13 protein-coding genes into the nuclear genome; (5) accumulation of metabolic waste products in the lysosome, eliminated by the addition of microbial enzymes that can degrade such material; (6) accumulation of molecularwaste products in the extracellular space, removed either by direct degradation in situ or by immune-mediated endocytosis and transport to the lysosome; and (7) stiffening of the extracellular matrix, caused by accumulation of covalent crosslinks and reversed by drugs or enzymes that cleave those links. In 2007, together with his long-standing colleague Michael Rae, Dr. de Grey published a detailed, semi-technical description of SENS, entitled “Ending Aging” (published by St. Martin’s Press). This was updated in paperback form a year later, with the addition of a new chapter covering the latest progress. While these seven research themes constitute the current portfolio of SENS, they do not encompass the entire activities of SENS Research Foundation. First, there is no complacency regarding the risk that additional types of damage may be discov- ered that also need to be repaired; some of SRF’s projects explore that possibility. Second, SRF pursues some projects that re- late to the social context of its research, such as the mechanisms for rapid dissemination of therapies and the demographic and economic features of a post-aging world. And third, SRF allocates significant resources to outreach and education. A key, but particularly controversial, aspect of SENS is that it can potentially extend healthy lifespan without limit, even though these repair processes will probably never be perfect, as the repair only needs to approach perfection rapidly enough to keep the overall level of damage below pathogenic levels with periodic reapplication. Dr. de Grey has termed this required rate of improvement of repair therapies “longevity escape velocity”. The implication that many people alive today may live four- digit lifespans, even though the current SENS research portfolio is unlikely to extend longevity by more than a few decades, has engendered substantial publicity. Dr. de Grey is a prolific and highly-sought public speaker, giving around 50 lectures per year to diverse audiences, ranging among biologists, economists, demographers, business leaders, students and even theologians, as well as the general public. His TED talk has received over 3 million views. He also gives around 100 interviews per year worldwide, and has appeared on 60 Minutes, Barbara Walters, the Colbert Report, the BBC, Canadian CBC, Al Jazeera, and national TV in most European coun- tries.

Dr. de Grey is a Fellow of both the Gerontological Society of America and the American Aging Association, and sits on the editorial and scientific advisory boards of numerous journals and organisations. These include the Maximum Life Foundation, Legendary Pharmaceuticals, the Centenarian Species and Rockfish Project, Alcor Life Extension Foundation, the Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence, the Foresight Institute, Biomind, the Lifeboat Foundation, Humanity+, the Campaign for Aging Research, Mitochondrion, AGE (the Journal of the American Aging Association), Current Stem Cell Research & Ther- apy, and Current Gerontology and Geriatrics Research.

KEY PUBLICATIONS de Grey ADNJ, Ames BN, Andersen JK, et al. Time to talk SENS: critiquing the immutability of human aging. Annals NY Acad Sci 2002; 959: 452-62. de Grey ADNJ, Baynes JW, Berd D, Heward CB, Pawelec G, Stock G. Is human aging still mysterious enough to be left only to scientists? BioEssays 2002; 24(7):667-676. de Grey ADNJ. Escape velocity: why the prospect of extreme human life extension matters now. PLoS Biol 2004; 2(6): 723-726. de Grey ADNJ, Campbell FC, Dokal I, et al. Total deletion of in vivo telomere elongation capacity: an ambitious but possibly ultimate cure for all age-related human cancers. Annals NY Acad Sci 2004; 1019: 147-70. de Grey ADNJ, Alvarez PJJ, Brady RO, et al. Medical bioremediation: prospects for the application of microbial catabolic diversity to aging and several major age-related diseases. Ageing Res Rev 2005; 4(3):315-38. de Grey ADNJ. The unfortunate influence of the weather on the rate of aging: why human caloric restriction or its emulation may only extend life expectancy by 2-3 years. Gerontology 2005; 51(2): 73-82. de Grey ADNJ. Protagonistic pleiotropy: why cancer may be the only pathogenic effect of accumulating nuclear mutations and epimutations in aging. Mech Ageing Dev 2007; 128(7-8): 456-9. Phoenix CR, de Grey ADNJ. A model of aging as accumulated damage matches observed mortality patterns and predicts the life-extending effects of prospec- tive interventions. AGE 2007; 29(4): 133-89.