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Crypt0n0ob t1_j2m1j9e wrote

Reply to comment by ihateshadylandlords in A Drug to Treat Aging May Not Be a Pipe-Dream by Mynameis__--__

Meh. I hope I’m wrong, but looks like cure of aging is new “fusion energy” and “new battery breakthrough”

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civilrunner t1_j2mp8aq wrote

Fusion energy has been progressing steadily towards working though.

Battery breakthroughs also happen fairly often. Solid state batteries are genuinely approaching market readiness in 2025 and 2026.

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Crypt0n0ob t1_j2mub7b wrote

I thought so as well especially after recent announcement but just find out that it was mostly publicity stunt like every previous fusion related news.

Joe Scott explains it better than me https://youtu.be/SpuS7axls7k

We definitely are at better place when it comes to fusion than we were 20 years ago, but fusion energy isn’t going to power our houses at least for few more decades.

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civilrunner t1_j2mwfbu wrote

Yes, however laser fusion was never the closest thing to market viability. You have to look at high temperature super conductor magnetic fusion like commonwealth fusion and others.

Even ITER will likely be outdated by the time it turns on.

Quantum computing (which is expected to be useful in early 2030s or even late 2020s) will allow for simulating material properties especially for high temperature super conductors to rapidly iterate on materials to find better ones. Then higher temperature super conductors enable stronger magnetic fields by having an increased electrical current capacity while super conducting. This increased magnetic field makes one need a far smaller arc radius to achieve sustainable fusion, the smaller arc radius dramatically reduces on iteration time and therefore massively accelerates our ability to reach a grid ready fusion reactor.

Higher temperature super conductors are so useful for fusion that a room temperature one would enable even micro reactors with an arc radius of less than an inch to achieve the pressures needed for fusion to take place. The energy output scales linearly with the arc radius, but to the cube of the magnetic field which scales linearly with the super conducting temperature threshold.

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footurist t1_j2mh5ns wrote

Well, remember that author is talking about the potential success of one of the more targeted treatments, e.g. the senolytics drugs for macular degeneration, which would pave the way for future complimentary drug development to one day cover most of what's causing aging. He doesn't mean "signs of ultimate anti aging drug end of 2023".

And if one has read a bit into the topic, one knows that the aging process is mostly understood in this way aswell, e.g. by Aubrey de Grey.

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civilrunner t1_j2mpo36 wrote

In my view Aubrey De Gray also isn't at the cutting edge that much anymore in the longevity field. Sinclair has a good overview of the aging process but is also too focused on supplements like metformin and NMN.

Cellular reprogramming has been absurdly promising though and has countless highly funded startups bringing it to market.

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footurist t1_j2muc6c wrote

Isn't the major problem with cellular reprogramming accidental introduction of fatal side effects like cancer? I haven't been reading much about this topic, though.

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civilrunner t1_j2mved9 wrote

Yes, though Sinclair's lab found that simply ignoring one of the yamanaka factors prevented the cancerous growths while still reversing significant damage without reverting the cellular identity to a stem cell.

They're already approaching clinical trials for Cellular reprogramming in some specific targets like heart tissue in heart attack survivors and more.

Calico funded by alphabet, Altos Labs funded by Bezos, and countless others are focused on bringing cellular reprogramming to market and have billions in funding to do so.

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footurist t1_j3i0j06 wrote

It's relevant to mention here that Sinclair is on a different train than De Grey. He thinks getting to 150 years is possible in a reasonable time frame. De Grey thinks LEV is possibly and subsequently functional immortality.

So maybe ignoring this factor reduces the potential quite a bit.

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civilrunner t1_j3i0xjm wrote

I actually think Sinclair is simply saying 150 to not sound crazy. He clearly believes that epigenetic reprogramming can be done unlimited times and therefore there is no biological limit, if we can get to 150 then we can have no biological age limit.

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footurist t1_j3i1dwu wrote

Could be. On altos labs landing page I noticed a surprising lack of the word "age", lol.

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civilrunner t1_j3i1y5s wrote

Yeah, all of them want to stay away from saying immortal or LEV to distance themselves. When or if we see people reversing in age due to body wide epigenetic reprogramming then we'll know we got to the point when aging is no a limit to longevity.

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GhostInTheNight03 t1_j2nzfse wrote

Guarantee it will be AI at the forefront within the next decade, not any individual person

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Homie4-2-0 t1_j2nk9g7 wrote

Helion Energy is building a machine that will achieve net electricity in 2024. Zap Energy is going for net energy this year. Lithium Sulfur batteries were perfected earlier this year. At this point, if curing aging shares any resemblance, I would be extremely optimistic.

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Villad_rock t1_j2nmc1d wrote

What does net electricity mean? Does it account for literally every energy which is used for the reactor?

I read about a story of a laser ignited fusion which achieved net positive the first time which actually meant more power was generated than the laser needed. But you don’t only operate the laser.

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Homie4-2-0 t1_j2nprrk wrote

From what I recall, net electricity accounts for everything and net energy is what you're referring to with the lasers. Zap is aiming for net electricity by 2026. (they call it engineering breakeven IIRC) Also, keep in mind that the experiment at NIF was done using old lasers. If they had used newer lasers, they would have produced more energy than the overhead involved in running the experiment.

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