General Concepts for
Directions to Proceed with the
21st Century Biotechnology Group
At the heart of JVP's Biotech Group is the
ultimate mission of life extension without degradation of
life quality.Ever since man first appreciated the
horror and finality of individual death, he has tried to
invent ways of overcoming this all-encompassing and
overwhelming problem. Of all recorded time, dating back at
least 10,000 years, virtually every culture has attempted to
insure itself a state of immortality. From early mythology
and legend, to cultures the world over, to the formation of
more formalized religions, each group had to have a way of
escaping oblivion.Unfortunately, due to the political
consequences of organized religion and their intolerance of
others who were of unlike mind, any significant
technological progress was greatly suppressed. Since the
discovery of the natural laws necessary to create technology
must be derived from a non-mystical, rational scientific
method, this intellectual and experimental approach was in
direct conflict with the teachings by those in control. At
the heart of these teachings was and still is the
unquestioning acceptance on "faith" of their view
of the world. Thus the scientific method and its necessary
conclusions were perceived as a great threat to their
political control. Scientific discoveries generally occurred
in spite of not with the help of controlling competing
ideologies.It was not until 20th Century
physics was applied to biology and medicine did we see any
real way of developing the technology necessary to achieve
our ultimate goal. This application has resulted in an
exponential increase in our knowledge base. After 10,000
years of human history, the true biophysical mechanisms that
are necessary for the human animal to function are finally
yielding their long held secrets.Only when we have a complete understanding
of the processes can we engineer the technology necessary to
effect a real change in our maximum life expectancy. All
attempts to do this in the past have only rectangularized
the curve, (This term relates to a graph that shows the
relationship between any given population in numbers of
individuals on the "y" axis verses time in years
on the "x" axis. Thus, the greater the number of
people still alive at any given time, the more rectangular
the curve of the graph).We are now finally on the threshold of
controlling our destiny in this area of medicine, or more
properly Biomedical Engineering. The tools we need to
accomplish this feat can be placed in three broad
categories:
1. The determination of both the
structural and functional significance of the entire
sequence of our human genome.
This means not only determining the "letters and
words" of the genome but how the "words"
are used to compose "sentences, paragraphs and
chapters." This means answering the following four
questions:
What proteins are encoded from the
transcription of the base pairs of the DNA sequences that
make up every gene?What are their associated control genes,
and feedback mechanisms?What is the function of each protein and
how is it transported to and from the site of synthesis?Where and how each protein is stored and
in what quantities and under what conditions?
The financial community has finally
embrace biotech companies that have made great progress in
this field. In an historic announcement at the White House
comparable in significance to man’s first landing on the
moon, Celera Genomics (CRA, NYSE) and scientists from the
publicly financed Human Genome Project made history on
Monday, June 26, 2000 by announcing they had separately
almost finished rough drafts of the sequence of 3.1
billion chemical pairs that form the human book of life.
This came years before the public Human Genome Project had
any hope of completing this first draft of the genome and
was only accomplished by the brilliant innovations made by
Tim Hunkepiller and Craig Venter from the private sector.
2. Tissue engineering and the application
of the pleuripotent stem cell
(PSC). The key to our control of human life span
and quality of life initially lies in our ability
to engineer the regeneration of damaged or worn out cells,
tissues and body parts. Contrary to the dogma taught in
the world’s medical schools over the past century, we
now know that every cell in our body, no matter how highly
specialized, given the right conditions, can be
reprogrammed to become any other type of cell. The process
of replacement of a given cell type occurs naturally to a
very limited extent in most of our organ systems, most
recently now demonstrated in our brains.
Since the PSC represents an embryonic
like non-committed cell, it can be enlisted to become
whatever type of cell is needed under a given
circumstance. Having a supply of individualized PSC made
from the patient’s own cells (so that there would be
no possibility of rejection), would represent a
universal all purpose repair kit for any number of
medical conditions which result in damaged or
non-functioning organ systems. The technology to do
this, without the use of any embryo or egg source is now
available within the technologies held by our
Biotechnology Group.
Quantification
and localization of memory, consciousness and awareness of
self.
3. As the third and final step to
achieving indefinite lifespan, we need to have the
option to transfer our mind and memory to a structure
that is not vulnerable to deliberate or accidental
trauma, man made or natural. Marvin Minski, founder of
Artificial Intelligence at MIT, believes this is
possible once we are able to electrically control the
central neural circuitry that makes up memory.Even though our understanding of the
neural networks that make up a single stored memory, for
example, is relatively primitive we have just recently
discovered that in nature, some new neurons are formed
to substitute and replace others that have ceased
functioning normally. This was in the hippocampus where
it is believed certain types of memories reside. This
replacement or substitution mechanism may be a bridge
mechanism that could be employed to engineer a
transitional storage of memory outside of the original
circuits location. Anatomical localization of thought in
various locations in the human brain has already been
discovered at UCLA’s Institute for Brain Mapping
utilizing a modified fast PET scan. Other research
facilities throughout the country have seen similar
findings.Throughout modern history, biologists
who aligned themselves with the spiritualists believed
that we could never explain or deduce any part of what
made up living organisms. They were called the Vitalists.
When the chemical structure of urea (a biochemical found
in urine) was discovered, one of the first discoveries
of the biochemicals that make up living organisms, their
position moved back a step. They said, "well maybe
you can discover simple molecules of life, but you will
never be able to understand the complex ones, like those
responsible for inheritance as an example." Time
after time they have been forced to retreat from their
previous positions for several hundred years. Their last
bastion of retreat is their position that "well,
maybe you can discover all the body functioning
mechanism of life, but you will never explain the mind,
memory and thought in biophysical and biochemical
terms."
The time for the extinction of the
Vitalist position is close at hand.
These three critical tools will enable us
to reach our goal of not only extending high quality human
life, but we will be able to improve on it, and offer the
option of creating the proverbial BIONIC PERSON!
Tool #1:
With this tool or investigative process,
we will be able to determine which genes control the aging
process and which do not. Since there are an estimated
100,000+ genes in the human genome, how do we find which
ones are responsible for determining the length of our
lifespan? The approach that will have the best chance of
succeeding is to use an animal of much shorter lifespan than
our own. We will select individuals for breeding who exhibit
particularly long life spans, until their offspring’s
lifespan is 50 to 100% greater than it would have been
naturally. This information is then used as a template to
find corresponding genes in the human chromosomes.
Fortunately, many animals and even invertebrates have base
pair sequences for a majority of their genes that are nearly
identical to the human genome. This will give us a guided
pathway to the cluster of aging genes.This may sound like science fiction, but
this technology already exists, and it is among the
technologies available to our Biotech Group.As a dramatic example of alteration of
genetic components to control or alter lifespan, old and
aging cells can be made into young rejuvenated cells by
putting back the tips of their chromosomes that have
degenerated away with age. When you do this to a cell from
an old animal, activating an enzyme called telomerase
(rebuilds the telemeres at the very ends of each
chromosome), you transform old cells into cells that have
all the characteristics of cells found in a young adult.
This technology is also available to our Biotech Group.Another monumental breakthrough discovery
addressing the issue of whether it is possible to re-set the
clock of senescent cells was confirmed in a recent AAAS
Science publication in June of this year. In this study,
Michael West of Advanced Cell Technologies was able to show
that by placing an old senescent cell’s nucleus into a
young enucleated egg cell, the new micro-environment re-set
the genome of the old cell and transformed it into a very
young new cell.Its age is measured by the number of times
it can divide to form new "daughter" cells before
it becomes incapable of division and dies. Depending on the
cell type, most young new cells in fetal or new born animals
can divide (as measured in tissue culture) over a hundred
times before becoming senescent. But old aging cells,
shortly before they die, can only divide a few more times
before reaching their limit, often called "Hayflick’s
limit. And, as we would have predicted, these
transformed cells also experienced a lengthening of their
telemeres comparable to those of fetal animals instead of
those profoundly shortened telemeres seen in these very same
nuclei when they existed in their pre-transplanted form.Much of the philosophy and technological
developments described above, have come from the doctors and
scientists participating in the Gerontological Research
Group in Los Angeles. Gerontological Research, co-founded in
1992 by Steven M. Kaye, MD and Stephen Coles, MD, PhD., has
become a "Rand Corporation" think tank for life
extension research and development.The JVP Venture Fund Biotechnology Group
has full access to the world’s most advanced thinking, and
visionary medical scientists.
With the vast resource of intellectual
property and individuals at our disposal, a stable funding mechanism and the proper corporate behavior and structure,
the 21st Century will see an incredible
revolution in the quality and length of individual human
life that surpasses anything ever experienced by mankind,
except in his hopes and dreams.
FOR
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION on any JVP service, domestic or
international, or to request a copy of a JVP document or
paper, or to correspond with Dr. Kaye, please contact our
Corporate Office via Email at: general.info@jvp.com |
