A genetic profile in 214 Ashkenazi Jewish centenarians and
nonagenarians linked to longevity and discovered by two Israeli
researchers at New York's Albert Einstein College of Medicine
lends clues to healthy aging in non-Ashkenazi and non-Jewish
populations around the world. The study is being published in
the April 4 edition of the Public Library of Science on-line
journal (www.plos.org), run by a non-profit organization of
scientists and physicians committed to making the world's
scientific and medical literature a freely available public
resource. Dr. Nir Barzilai, director of the Institute for Aging
Research at Yeshiva University's medical school, and Dr. Gil
Atzmon looked for genetic clues to longevity in the Ashkenazim.
They chose this group because - as shown by historical records
and modern genetic evidence - Ashkenazim are descended from a
founder group of just 30,000 people and thus are more
genetically uniform than other demographic groups. This, they
explained, simplified the challenge of associat