Abstract: Nowadays those involved in aging research view aging in terms of a genetic disease rather than as a natural, evolution-driven process by which the old make way for the young. A condition of aged friends and relatives seems terrible to conceive; they are afflicted with a ghastly wasting disease, a plague whose effects are inescapable because of our own genes. People plagued with Werner syndrome do not even have the opportunity to experience this …showed first 75 words of 2966 total…

…showed last 75 words of 2966 total…rapid acceleration in aging, appears to encode a DNA-unwinding enzyme, and may provide clues to cancer and other diseases of old age. Yu, Chang-En; Oshima, Junko. "Positional Cloning of the Werner's syndrome Gene". Science, vol 272. Geriatric Research Education and Clinical Center. Seattle, 1996. The identification of a mutative putative helicase as the gene product of the Werner's syndrome gene suggests that defective DNA metabolism is involved in the complex process of aging in Werner' syndrome patients.