The mutant and the secret of longevity

People living in remote villages in Ecuador have a mutant form that can help discover the secret of longevity, according to biologists.

One person has Laron (second from left) and children in Ecuador.(Photo: NYT)

The villagers here have small stature, less than 1 meter in height, and have a rare mutation called Laron symptom, or also called a Laron-type dwarf. They may be descendants of Jews

Serphadi from Spain and Portugal. A special feature is that most mutants Laron are immune to two diseases related to age are cancer and diabetes.

After accidentally discovering these special people in 1987, Dr. Jaime Guevara-Aguirre, Ecuadorian doctor and diabetes expert, spent 24 years studying a group of 99 villagers suffering from Laron symptoms. For a long time, Dr. Guevara-Aguirre updated the health data of this group and found that they did not suffer from any cancer. And they never had diabetes even though many people were obese.

According to The New York Times , the information from Dr. Guevara-Aguirre opened up golden opportunities for scientists seeking the source of immortality like Valter D.Longo, an expert at the University of Southern California ( America). The results of the study later showed that Laron patients were mutated in genes that created receptors of growth hormone, making it impossible to interact with this hormone. Consequently, they do not grow as tall as normal people when they reach puberty. In return for modest height, healthy Laron dwarfs and much longer lives.

When applying discoveries in Laron dwarfs to lab animals, the results were very positive . Life expectancy in the laboratory is abnormally prolonged and they do not suffer from age-related illness. For example, a mouse at the University of Southern Illinois has lived twice as long as normal in mice after mutating like the Laron. Currently Dr. Guevara-Aguirre and Longo have found a way to maintain the above positive results and still help people with Laron get rid of permanent dwarfism. Just by being given growth hormone before puberty, these patients will almost be able to grow in height as usual.