New Delhi: The oldest living man in the world is Brazilian. Some Brazilians even live to be 110, while being active and mentally sound. Now, a group of scientists think it is time to study the country’s supercentenarian population to decode the secrets behind human longevity.
An article published on 6 January in Genomic Psychiatry states that Brazil is one of the world’s most underutilised settings for genomic studies to understand human longevity. According to the article by researchers from the University of Sao Paolo, most human longevity studies focus on genetically homogenous groups. However, this misses the number of helpful genetic changes that can occur in societies with a more heterogeneous population, like in Brazil.
From Indigenous tribal populations to European colonisation to the forced migration of Africans to later migrations of even Japanese populations, Brazil is supposed to have the richest genetic diversity in the world. The hypothesis goes that genetic diversity results in more DNA changes, meaning more chances of improved immune responses and genetic causes of longevity.
The authors themselves are currently studying centenarians and supercentenarians in Brazil, and have found examples of people staying alive and functional to a very old age, despite limited access to healthcare. While not exactly developing a causal relationship, this study indicates that there is enough evidence in Brazil to study the genetic varieties and understand how genetic changes can give humans long life expectancies.