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Genetics of Aging: Effective Selection for Increased Longevity in Drosophila

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Insect Aging

Abstract

Attaining an understanding of the mechanisms controlling the aging process has proven to be a uniquely difficult biological problem. Many hypotheses have been advanced offering explanations for the phenomenon of senescence at a variety of different operational levels, ranging from the molecular to the evolutionary. Indeed, to better focus future research efforts a recent review volume is explicitly directed towards summarizing the currently popular theories of aging (Adelman and Roth 1982). One of the more intractable problems facing the experimental gerontologist is to determine whether the various well described age-dependent changes are the underlying cause of aging or whether they are the result of some pacemaker process, which governs the events and rate of aging (Moment 1982). It has occurred to many people that a genetic approach to this problem should allow one to effectively separate those age-dependent changes which are causally related to the aging process from those that are not so related. In Lints’ (1978) review of the literature, he concluded that aging was undoubtedly a genetically controlled phenomenon but that there were no obvious tools, then in existence, with which to exploit this insight. In particular, he pointed out that experiments which selected for longer and shorter life spans were badly needed.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biological Sciences, Wayne State University, Detroit, MI, 48202, USA

    M. Clare

Authors
  1. R. Arking
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  2. M. Clare
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Institut für Biologie I (Zoologie), Universität Freiburg, Albertstraße 21 a, D-7800, Freiburg, Germany

    Klaus-GĂĽnter Collatz

  2. Department of Biology, Southern Methodist University, Dallas, TX, 75275, USA

    Rajindar S. Sohal

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© 1986 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

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Arking, R., Clare, M. (1986). Genetics of Aging: Effective Selection for Increased Longevity in Drosophila . In: Collatz, KG., Sohal, R.S. (eds) Insect Aging. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-70853-4_17

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-70853-4_17

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-642-70855-8

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-642-70853-4

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

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