Immortality, Inc.

by Chip Walter

  All of these discussions, and the many phone conversations and emails that followed, were also supplemented by stacks of books, magazines, and websites as I attempted to complete my research. The following list is by no mean exhaustive, but I hope it will be helpful to any readers who are interested in investigating the subject further.

  INTERVIEWS

  Arthur Levinson, Calico Labs

  Raymond Kurzweil, Alphabet, Inc.

  J. Craig Venter, Human Longevity, Inc./The J. Craig Venter Institute

  Robert Hariri, Human Longevity, Inc./Celularity

  Peter Diamandis, Human Longevity, Inc./Celularity

  Aubrey de Grey, SENS Research Foundation

  Bill Maris, Section

  Hal Barron, Calico Labs

  David Botstein, Calico Labs

  Cynthia Kenyon, Calico Labs

  Daphne Koller, Calico Labs

  Bob Cohen, Calico Labs

  Ken Bloom, Human Longevity, Inc.

  Brad Perkins, Human Longevity, Inc.

  William Briggs, Human Longevity, Inc.

  Amalio Telenti, Human Longevity, Inc.

  Riccardo Sabatini, Human Longevity, Inc.

  David Karow, Human Longevity, Inc.

  Heather Kowalski, Human Longevity, Inc./The J. Craig Venter Institute

  Max More, Alcor Life Extension Foundation

  Hugh Hixon, Alcor Life Extension Foundation

  Aaron Drake, Alcor Life Extension Foundation

  Diane Cremeens, Alcor Life Extension Foundation

  J. Craig George, North Slope Borough Department of Wildlife Management

  Joon Yun, Palo Alto Investors, LLC

  Jason Pontin, MIT Technology Review

  Herbert Boyer, Genentech, Inc.

  David Masci, Pew Research Center

  Carolyn Funk, Pew Research Center

  BOOKS

  Botstein, David. Decoding the Language of Genetics. Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, 2015.

  Buettner, Dan. The Blue Zones: 9 Lessons for Living Longer From the People Who Have Lived the Longest. National Geographic, 2012.

  ———. The Blue Zones Solution: Eating and Living Like the World’s Healthiest People. National Geographic, 2015.

  Dawkins, Richard. The Blind Watchmaker. Penguin, 1986.

  ———. The Selfish Gene. Oxford University Press, 1989.

  De Grey, Aubrey D. N. J. The Mitochondrial Free Radical Theory of Aging (Molecular Biology Intelligence series). R. G. Landis Co., 1999.

  De Grey, Aubrey D. N. J. with Michael Rae. Ending Aging—The Rejuvenation Breakthroughs That Could Reverse Human Aging in Our Lifetime. St. Martin’s Press, 2007.

  “Dementia Cases Set to Triple by 2050 but Still Largely Ignored” (news release). The World Health Organization, April 11, 2012. www.who.int/mediacentre/news/releases/2012/dementia_20120411/en.

  Friedman, Howard S., and Leslie R. Martin. The Longevity Project. Hudson Street Press, 2011.

  Gertner, Jon. The Idea Factory: Bell Labs and the Great Age of American Innovation. Penguin Press, 2012.

  Kurzweil, Raymond. The Age of Spiritual Machines: When Computers Exceed Human Intelligence. Penguin Books, 2000.

  ———. How to Create a Mind: The Secret of Human Thought Revealed. Viking Press, 2013.

  ———. The Singularity Is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology. Viking Press, 2005.

  ———. The 10% Solution for a Healthy Life: How to Reduce Fat in Your Diet and Eliminate Virtually All Risk of Heart Disease. Crown Publishers, 1993.

  Kurzweil, Raymond, and Terry Grossman. Fantastic Voyage: Live Long Enough to Live Forever. Rodale Press, 2005.

  ———. Transcend: Nine Steps to Living Well Forever. Rodale, 2011.

  Moravec, Hans P. Mind Children: The Future of Robot and Human Intelligence. Harvard University Press, 1988.

  ———. Robot: Mere Machine to Transcendent Mind. Oxford University Press, 1999.

  More, Max, and Natasha Vita-More. The Transhumanist Reader: Classical and Contemporary Essays on the Science, Technology, and Philosophy of the Human Future. Oxford: John Wiley & Sons, 2013.

  Mukherjee, Siddhartha. The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer. Scribner, 2010.

  Nuland, Sherwin, B. How We Die: Reflections on Life’s Final Chapter. Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., 1994.

  Shreeve, James. The Genome War: How Craig Venter Tried to Capture the Code of Life and Save the World. Alfred A. Knopf, 2004.

  Smith Hughes, Sally. Genentech: The Beginnings of Biotech. University of Chicago Press, 2011.

  Venter, J. Craig. A Life Decoded: My Genome: My Life, Penguin Books, 2008.

  ———. Life at the Speed of Light: From the Double Helix to the Dawn of Digital Life. Penguin Books, 2014.

  Watson, James D. The Double Helix: A Personal Account of the Discovery of the Structure of DNA. Atheneum, 1968.

  Watson, James D., Andrew James Berry, and Kevin Davies. DNA: The Story of the Genetic Revolution. Alfred A. Knopf, 2017.

  Weiner, Jonathan. Long for This World: The Strange Science of Immortality. Ecco, 2011.

  MAGAZINES AND WEBSITES

  Abdelgadir, Elamin, Razan Ali, Fauzia Rashid, and Alaaeldin Bashier. “Effect of Metformin on Different Non-Diabetes Related Conditions, a Special Focus on Malignant Conditions.” Journal of Clinical Medicine Research 9, no. 5 (2017). www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/artides/PMC5380171.

  Aberlin, Mary Beth. “Age-Old Questions: How Do We Age, and Can We Slow It Down?” The Scientist, March 1, 2015.

  Achenbach, Joel. “Harvard Professor Says He Can Cure Aging, But Is That a Good Idea.” Washington Post (Achenblog), December 2, 2015. washingtonpost.com/news/achenblog/wp/2015/12/02/professor-george-church-says-he-can-reverse-the-aging-process.

  Asian Scientist Newsroom. “Removing Old Cells Could Prevent Arthritis.” Asian Scientist, June 14, 2017.

  Baer, Drake. “5 Amazing Predictions by Futurist Ray Kurzweil That Came True—and 4 That Haven’t.” Business Insider, October 20, 2015. www.businessinsider.com.au/15-startling-incredible-and-provactive-predictions-from-googles-genius-futurist-2015-9.

  Bansal, Ankita, and Heidi A. Tissenbaum. “Quantity or Quality? Living Longer Doesn’t Necessarily Mean Living Healthier.” The Scientist, March 1, 2015.

  Bohnert, K. Adam, and Cynthia Kenyon. “A Lysosomal Switch Triggers Proteostasis Renewal in the Immortal C. elegans Germ Lineage.” Nature, November 30, 2017.

  Brooker, Katrina. “Google Wants You to Live Forever.” Bloomberg Markets, April 2015.

  Buettner, Dan. “The Island Where People Forget to Die.” New York Times, October 24, 2012. www.nytimes.com/2012/10/28/magazine/the-island-where-people-forget-to-die.html.

  Buhr, Sarah. “With $250 Million, Peter Diamandis’ New Startup Is All About Taking Stem Cells From Placentas.” TechCrunch, February 15, 2018.

  “Cancer Progress Report 2011: Transforming Patient Care Through Innovation.” The American Association for Cancer Research, 2011. www.cancerprogressreport.org/Pages/cpr11-contents.aspx.

  Connor, Steve. “The Miracle Cure: Scientists Turn Human Skin Into Stem Cells.” The Independent, February 9, 2014.

  Cross, Ryan. “This $25,000 Physical Has Found Some ‘Serious’ Health Problems. Others Say It Has Serious Problems.” Science, May 12, 2017. sciencemag.org/news/2017/05/25000-physical-has-found-some-serious-health-problems-others-say-it-has-serious.

  Cutas, D. E. “Life Extension, Overpopulation and the Right to Life: Against Lethal Ethics.” The Journal of Medical Ethics, August 29, 2008.

  De Grey, Aubrey. 1997. “A Proposed Refinement of the Mitochondrial Free Radical Theory of Aging.” Bioessays, February 1997.

  ———. “Life Span Extension Research and Public Debate: Societal Considerations.” Methuselah Foundation, August 7, 2011. www.sens.org/files/pdf/ENHANCE-PP.pdf.

  De Magalhães, João Pedro. “The Big, the Bad and the Ugly: Extreme Animals as Inspiration for Biomedical Research.” EMBO Reports, July 3, 2015.

  Di Iulio, Julia, I
stvan Bartha, Emily H. M. Wong, Hung-Chun Yu, Victor Lavrenko, Dongchan Yang, Inkyung Jung, Michael A. Hicks, Naisha Shah, Ewen F. Kirkness, Martin M. Fabani, William H. Biggs, Bing Ren, J. Craig Venter, and Amalio Telenti. “The Human Noncoding Genome Defined by Genetic Diversity.” Nature Genetics 50 (2018): 333–37. nature.com/articles/s41588-018-0062-7.

  Friend, Tad. “The God Pill.” The New Yorker, April 3, 2017.

  Golden, Frederick, and Michael D. Lemonick. 2000. “The Race Is Over.” Time, July 3, 2000.

  “Google Announces Calico, a New Company Focused on Health and Well-Being.” News from Google, September 18, 2013. googlepress.blogspot.com/2013/09/calico-announcement.html.

  Gump, Jacob M., and Andrew Thorburn. “Autophagy and Apoptosis—What’s the Connection?” Trends in Cell Biology 21, no. 7 (2011): 387–92. www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3539742.

  Hariri, Robert J. “Method of Collecting Placental Stem Cells.” U.S. Patent No. 7045148; Filed: December 5, 2001. patents.justia.com/patent/20020123141#history.

  Herships, Sally. “There Are More Adult Diapers Sold in Japan Than Baby Diapers.” Marketplace, August 29, 2016. marketplace.org/2016/08/09/world/japans-changing-culture.

  Highfield, Roger. “What’s Wrong With Craig Venter?: Multi-Millionaire Maverick, Says He Can Help You Live a Better, Longer Life.” New Republic, February 2, 2016.

  Hou, Yujun, Sofie Lautrup, Stephanie Cordonnier, Yue Wang, Deborah L. Croteau, Eduardo Zavala, Yongqing Zhang, et al. “NAD+ Supplementation Normalizes Key Alzheimer’s Features and DNA Damage Responses in a New AD Mouse Model With Introduced DNA Repair Deficiency.” PNAS 115, no. 8 (2018): E1876–85. www.pnas.org/content/115/8/E1876.

  Ingraham, Christopher. “Americans Are Dying Younger Than People in Other Rich Nations.” Washington Post, December 27, 2017. washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/12/27/americans-are-dying-younger-than-people-in-other-rich-nations.

  Jeon, Ok Hee, Chaekyu Kim, Remi-Martin Laberge, Marco Demaria, Sona Rathod, Alain P. Vasserot, Jae Wook Chung, et al. “Local Clearance of Senescent Cells Attenuates the Development of Post-Traumatic Osteoarthritis and Creates a Pro-Regenerative Environment.” Nature Medicine 23 (2017): 775–81.

  Jones, Brad. “A Breakthrough Initiative Has Been Announced to Manufacture Human Organs.” Futurism (Health & Medicine), November 11, 2017.

  Joseph, Nancy. “Leading Biotechnology Into the 21st Century.” Perspectives Newsletter, College of Arts and Sciences: University of Washington, June 1, 2000.

  Keane, Michael, Jeremy Semeiks, Bo Thomsen, and Joao Pedro De Magalhaes. “Insights Into the Evolution of Longevity From the Bowhead Whale Genome.” Cell Reports, January 6, 2015. cell.com/cell-reports/pdf/S2211-1247(14)01019-5.pdf.

  Keep, Elmo. “Can Human Mortality Really Be Hacked?” Smithsonian, June 2017.

  Kirkwood, Thomas. “Why Can’t We Live Forever?” Scientific American, September 2010.

  Kurzweil, Ray. “How My Predictions Are Faring: An Update by Ray Kurzweil.” Kurzweil Accelerating Intelligence (blog), October 1, 2010. www.kurzweilai.net/images/How-My-Predictions-Are-Faring.pdf.

  Lamming, Dudley W., and Sabatini, David M. “A Radical Role for TOR in Longevity.” Cell Metabolism 13, no. 6 (2011): 617–18. cell.com/cell-metabolism/fulltext/S1550-4131(11)00186-0.

  Lewis, Kaitlyn N., Ilya Soifer, Eugene Melamud, Margaret Roy, R. Scott McIsaac, Matthew Hibbs, and Rochelle Buffenstein. “Unraveling the Message: Insights Into Comparative Genomics of the Naked Mole-Rat.” Mammalian Genome 27, no. 7–8 (2016): 259–78. www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4935753.

  López-Otin, Carlos, Maria A. Blasco, Linda Partidge, Manuel Serrano, and Guido Kroemer. “The Hallmarks of Aging.” Cell, June 6, 2013.

  Masci, David, and Funk, Carolyn. “Living to 120 and Beyond: Americans’ Views on Aging, Medical Advances and Radical Life Extension.” Pew Research Center, August 6, 2013. pewforum.org/2013/08/06/living-to-120-and-beyond-americans-views-on-aging-medical-advances-and-radical-life-extension.

  ———. “To Count Our Days: The Scientific and Ethical Dimensions of Radical Life Extension.” Pew Research Center, August 6, 2013. pewforum.org/2013/08/06/to-count-our-days-the-scientific-and-ethical-dimensions-of-radical-life-extension.

  McCracken, Harry, and Lev Grossman. “Google vs. Death: How CEO Larry Page Has Transformed the Search Giant Into a Factory for Moonshots.” Time, September 30, 2013. doi.org/10.1038/s41588-018-0062-7.

  Miller, Claire Cain, and Pollack, Andrew. “Tech Titans Form Biotechnology Company.” New York Times, September 18, 2013.

  Moustafa, Ahmed, Chao Xie, Ewen Kirkness, William Biggs, Emily Wong, Yaron Turpaz, Kenneth Bloom, Eric Delwart, Karen E. Nelson, J. Craig Venter, and Amalio Telenti. “The Blood DNA Virome in 8,000 Humans.” PLOS/Pathogens 13, no. 3 (2017): e1006292. doi.org/10.1371/journal.ppat.1006292.

  Ocampo, Alejandro, Pradeep Reddy, Paloma Martinez-Redondo, Aida Platero-Luengo, Fumiyuki Hatanaka, Tomoaki Hishida, Mo Li, David Lam, et al. “In Vivo Amelioration of Age-Associated Hallmarks by Partial Reprogramming.” Cell, December 15, 2016.

  O’Keefe, Brian. “Ray Kurzweil—The Smartest (or the Nuttiest) Futurist on Earth.” Fortune, May 14, 2007.

  Park, Alice. “Alzheimer’s from a New Angle.” Time, February 11, 2016.

  ———. “In 40 Years of Cancer Research, How Far Have We Come?” Time, September 21, 2011.

  Pringle, Heather. “Long Live the Humans.” Scientific American, October 2013.

  Rosa, Cheryl, Judith Zeh, J. Craig George, Oliver Botta, Melanie Zauscher, Jeffrey Bada, and Todd M. O’Hara. “Age Estimates Based on Aspartic Acid Racemization for Bowhead Whales (Balaena mysticetus) Harvested in 1998–2000 and the Relationship Between Racemization Rate and Body Temperature.” Marine Mammal Science, July 2013.

  Rosenthal, Elizabeth. “Bird Flu Going to East Africa, United Nations Officials Fear.” New York Times International, October 20, 2005.

  Ruby, J. Graham, Megan Smith, and Rochelle Buffenstein. “Naked Mole-Rat Mortality Rates Defy Gompertzian Laws by Not Increasing With Age.” eLife 7 (2018): e31157. elifesciences.org/articles/31157.

  Shermer, Michael. “Radical Life-Extension Is Not Around the Corner-Can Science and Silicon Valley Defeat Death?” Scientific American, October 1, 2016. scientificamerican.com/article/radical-life-extension-is-not-around-the-corner.

  Sifferlin, Alexandra. “How Silicon Valley Is Trying to Hack Its Way Into a Longer Life.” Time, February 16, 2017.

  Simon, Stacy. “Cancer Statistics Report: Death Rate Down 23% in 21 Years.” The American Cancer Society, January 7, 2016. cancer.org/latest-news/cancer-statistics-report-death-rate-down-23-percent-in-21-years.html.

  Smith, Robin L. “The Regeneration Generation: A Conversation With Bob Hariri, Vice-Chairman and Co-Founder of Human Longevity Inc.” Huffington Post, November 26, 2014.

  Swisher, Kara. “Former Google Ventures CEO Bill Maris Has Decided Not to Go Ahead With a New $230 Million Health Care Fund.” Recode, December 9, 2016. recode.net/2016/12/9/13901306/ceo-bill-maris-not-doing-230-million-health-care-fund.

  Tchkonia, Tamara, Yi Zhu, Jan Van Deursen, Judith Campisi, and James L. Kirkland. “Cellular Senescence and the Senescent Secretory Phenotype: Therapeutic Opportunities.” The Journal of Clinical Investigation, March 1, 2013.

  Terry, Mark. “New Jersey Startup Celularity Launches With Clinical Assets From Big Name Biotechs.” BioSpace, August 22, 2017.

  The Scientist Staff. “How We Age: From DNA Damage to Cellular Miscommunication, Aging Is a Mysterious and Multifarious Process.” The Scientist, March 1, 2015. the-scientist.com/features/how-we-age-35872.

  Tullis, Paul. “Are You Rich Enough to Live Forever?” Town and Country, March 30, 2017.

  Van Meter, Michael, Andrei Seluanov, and Vera Gorbunova. “Wrangling Retrotransposons—These Mobile Genetic Elements Can Wreak Havoc on the Genome.” The Scientist, March 1, 2015.

  Wade, Nicholas. “Scientist’s Plan: Map All DNA Within 3 Years.” New York Times, May 3, 1998.

>   ———. “Craig Venter: A Maverick Making Waves.” New York Times, July 27, 2000.

  White, Mary C., Dawn M. Holman, Jennifer E. Boehm, Lucy A. Peipins, Melissa Grossman, and S. Jane Henley. “Age and Cancer Risk; A Potentially Modifiable Relationship.” The American Journal of Preventative Medicine 46, no. 3, Suppl. 1 (2014): S7–S15. www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4544764.

  Williams, Ruth. “The Aging and Inflammation Link: A Protein That Keeps the Immune Response in Check Leads a Double Life as an Anti-Aging Factor.” The Scientist, May 24, 2012.

  World Alzheimer Report 2015: The Global Impact of Dementia. Alzheimer’s Disease International, January 2016.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Chip Walter is an author, journalist, filmmaker, and former CNN bureau chief. He has published articles in National Geographic, The Economist, the Wall Street Journal, and Scientific American, and he has written four earlier books, most recently Last Ape Standing: The Seven-Million-Year Story of How and Why We Survived. He lives in Pittsburgh. You can learn more about him and his writing at www.chipwalter.com and on Facebook or Twitter @chipwalter.