Heredity determines exactly half of our lives

Specialists from the laboratory of Professor Uri Alon turned to the extensive databases of twins from Sweden and Denmark. An important innovation was the inclusion of couples who grew up apart in the sample, which also made it possible to better assess the influence of the environment. The main problem with the old approaches was that they confused the natural decay of the body with external circumstances.

Death from infection, accident, or accident in the dry statistics looked the same as death from old age. This information has been masking the real contribution of genetics for years. In the last century, it was impossible to filter out such cases, as historical documents often did not contain the exact cause of death.

The authors of the project have developed an innovative algorithm that creates computer models of virtual twins. This made it possible to mathematically separate death due to an unfortunate combination of circumstances from the processes of biological aging. As soon as accidental deaths were put out of the picture, it became clear that the contribution of DNA was twice as high as is commonly thought.

The figures finally matched what biologists have long seen in animal experiments, eliminating the long-standing contradiction between theory and practice. It turned out that the program embedded in us by our parents plays the same role as our entire life path.

The reassessment of the role of heredity is changing the vector of healthcare development. Ben Schoenhar, who led the analysis, notes that earlier skepticism prevented the search for genetic variations that slow down aging, since it was believed that their influence was negligible compared to lifestyle.

Now that the enormous importance of innate mechanisms has been proven, there is a powerful incentive to search for specific DNA sites that prolong youth. Understanding the biology of aging opens the door to creating therapies that can not only treat diseases, but actually slow down the passage of time at the cellular level.