It is delightful but humbling to find my face at the start of these Proceedings--there are innumerable other faces which could equally weIl stand there, from among the band who have fore­ gathered at every gerontology conference since the subject was launched in its present form; but I deeply appreciate being there. Gerontology d. id not grow by accident. Its present standing is the fruit of careful planning, undertaken by European and American scientists back in the 1950's. In those days it was still a "fringe" science, and the conspirators had much the standing of the 1920's Interplanetary Society. The United States itself is the offspring of conspiracy, for when the results of conspiracy are beneficent, the conspirators become Founding Fathers. This has been the case with gerontology. The present meeting is especially gratifying because the papers have been recitals of normal, hard-science investigation. We had to get through the rigors of a long period of semantic argument and a long period of one-shot general theories before this kind of meeting, normal in all other research fields, could take place. It was also necesssary to breed in the menagerie a generation of excellent investigators aware of the theoretical background but unintimidated by it, who share our conviction that human aging is comprehensible and probably controllable, and who go into the laboratory to attack specifics.

Inhalt

Symposium Lecture - I.- Aging Research: Challenge of the Twenty-First Century.- Wear and Tear Hypotheses.- Introductory Remarks: Session II.- Antioxidants and Longevity of Mammalian Species.- Relationship between Metabolic Rate, Free Radicals, Differentiation and Aging: A Unified Theory.- State of Knowledge on Action of Food Restriction and Aging.- The Endocrine Response to Dietary Restriction in the Rat.- Age Dependent Changes in Mitochondria.- Aging in Cellular Proteins.- Introductory Remarks: With Consideration of a T-Cell Model for Aging in Cellular Proteins.- Implications of 5?-Nucleotidase and its Inhibitor for Cellular Aging and Cancer.- The Effects of Dehydroepiandrosterone on the Rate of Development of Cancer and Autoimmune Processes in Laboratory Rodents.- The Alteration of Enzymes in Aging Animals.- Differential and Similar Responses Between Rodent and Human Cells to DNA-Damaging Agents: Possible Implications for Cellular Aging.- Symposium Lecture - II.- Living All Your Life.- Changes in DNA with Age - I.- Environmental and Genetic Factors that Influence Immunity and Longevity in Mice.- Cellular Senescence: Factors Modulating Cell Proliferation In Vitro.- Changes in Genetic Organisation and Expression in Aging Cells.- Changes in DNA with Age - II.- The Significance of DNA Methylation in Cellular Aging.- DNA Manipulating Genes and the Aging Brain.- In Vivo Studies on DNA Repair and Turnover with Age.- Hypersensitivity to DNA-Damaging Agents in Abiotrophies: A New Explanation for Degeneration of Neurons, Photoreceptors and Muscle in Alzheimer, Parkinson and Huntington Diseases, Retinitis Pigmentosa and Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy.- Reliability Theoretic Methods and Aging: Critical Elements, Hierarchies and Longevity-Interpreting Survival Curves.- Symposium Lecture - III.- The Odds on Normal Aging.- Diseases Featuring Altered Rates of Aging.- Introductory Remarks.- Progeria, A Model Disease for the Study of Accelerated Aging.- Amyloid, Immunopathology and Aging.- In Vitro Studies of Werner Syndrome Cells: Aberrant Growth and Chromosome behavior.- Molecular Basis of the Accumulation of Abnormal Proteins in Progeria and Aging Fibroblasts.- Future Directions in Aging Research.- Rapporteurs: R. W. Hart and A. Turturro.- L. Hayflick.- J. E. Seegmiller.- Participants.