It’s being presented as if this were new news, but apparently the bright boys and girls who brought us the “why does senescence happen” ugliness have managed to confirm their findings, and it’s leaking out into the press.
I see this as unadulterated good news. If “aging” is the direct result of a body’s response to DNA damage, then it makes significant sense to start hurling research dollars into that field — because that threatens not only to get us closer to extending quality life, but ALSO gets to the heart of a number of other issues, such as viral infections, etcetera. Recall that several cancers are now strongly suspected to be the direct result of viral infections inflicting precisely this sort of damage.
As Glenn Reynolds says, I think “faster, please” is the operative phrase.
