Immortality Exists

(I realize that we were supposed to do a local nature blog but when I read this information I was too fascinated by it. Obviously this blog contains my opinions supported by factual information.)

"In life only two things are certain... Death and Taxes." is a very old quote of unknown origin, which burned itself into my memory as a child. Now it would seem that this quote needs to be rewritten to say "Sorry, it's just taxes now."

In 1990, the most spectacular discovery of all (and I mean ALL) time was made.



It was Immortality.

The first species with the ability to defy death and repeal the law of entropy. A biological evolution in a league of its own that is found in Turritopsis Nutricula, also known as the Immortal Jellyfish.

However it wasn't until January of 2009, nearly two decades after its initial discovery and testing, that the Immortal Jellyfish would be presented to the public. So how do Immortal Jellyfish live up to their names?

Well, when they reach maturity and reproduce they are supposed to die but if they feel the need to, they can completely revert back to their juvenile Polyp stage and go through their lifecycle all over again. Scientists have called this unique process transdifferentiation. Yeah it's just like that but much more difficult. Certain requirements must be met and there are consequences that accompany them.

First, the jellyfish must be in a stage of sexual maturity and that alone is no easy task in an ocean filled with predators. After sexual reproduction if the jellyfish feels threatened by a premature death from injury, starvation, or some other life ending crisis it can forcably change every cell in its body into a earlier/younger stage. The umbrella-like head folds inward and the tentacles are reabsorbed so that the body can return to its stationary life as a Polyp rooted to the ocean floor.

One of the consequences to being young again is that the Polyp has rendered itself immobile and defenseless. In its juvenille Polyp form, it must now spend several years slowly re-aging into its next stage of developement, which is a Polyp Hydroid Colony. This is where a few more complications arise. I failed to mention earlier that adult jellyfish reproduce sexually while their less mature form is also capable of reproducing, asexually. However this asexual reproduction is nothing more than a mass cloning of one genetic type of jellyfish into several.



So if the one Immortal Jellyfish reverts into its younger form it then grows up into several more copies of itself. These clones are all also fully capable of repeating this process...indefinately. The prospect a swarming clone army is potentially devastating if the population exceeds the sustaining environment. In this case the ocean. This little guy is only 4 to 5 millimeters in diameter and is known as a Hydrozoan and it is the key form to rejuventation instead of regeneration.

For those of you who read this and think "Now people can live longer." or "New anti-aging medicines will come from this discovery." you may be disappointed to find out that the key factor in this jellyfish's age control ability has to do with the simplistic design of its genetic code supported by chemical and hormonal changes. Sorry but human D.N.A. is far more complex and the result is a much longer regeneration time.