The mission of The Supercentenarian Research Foundation (SRF) is to promote scientific research into the causes of aging initially by funding investigations into its effects in supercentenarians (people who have attained the age of 110 years or greater). The knowledge gained from this research can then provide the opportunity to develop methodologies to improve the health and longevity of supercentenarians, their children, centenarians (those aged 100-109 years), and those of us who would otherwise never achieve such an exceptional life span.

Objectives of the SRF

The initial objectives of the SRF will include, but not be limited to, supporting research for the following functions:

• Identifying and validating supercentenarians' ages
• Determining the health and medical conditions of supercentenarians
• Monitoring the health of supercentenarians during their remaining lifetime
• Attempting to improve the health and longevity of supercentenarians
• Soliciting and obtaining autopsies of supercentenarians
• Characterizing as fully as possible the physiological and biological condition of supercentenarians down to the cellular and molecular level
• Determining why supercentenarians live longer than most people
• Determining why supercentenarians seldom live longer than 114 years
• Determining if the factors causing supercentenarians to age are relevant to aging in shorter-lived individuals.

SRF Scientific Guidelines

Current theories of aging are supported by accomplished scientists with valid arguments for their positions. These theories include:

• The role of free radicals and reactive carbonyls as primary destructive forces in the biology of aging
• Cellular loss and atrophy
• Cellular replicative senescence
• Accumulation of somatic nuclear DNA mutations
• Accumulation of somatic mitochondrial DNA mutations
• Intracellular accumulation of lipofuscin (cellular waste) in lysosomes
• Accumulation of amyloid fibrils
• The functional alteration of intracellular long-lived proteins
• Cross-linking of extracellular long-lived proteins
• Regulation of the IGF-1/insulin pathway

Rather than attempting to select which of these theories are relevant to aging of the super-old, the SRF will be guided by them, but will take an empirical, non-judgmental approach. The SRF will seek, instead, to be informed by the facts discovered from sponsored and other relevant research. Consideration will also be given to such age-related pathologies as cancer, atherosclerosis, diabetes, and Alzheimer's disease in conjunction with the contribution of the above listed functions to those diseases.

In addition to research of supercentenarians, the SRF may promote study of younger age groups that does not duplicate research already performed or being conducted by others. Particular attention will be given to close (first-degree) relatives (children, siblings, and parents) of supercentenarians for comparison with their aged kindred and with control groups. Research of non-human primates may also be supported. Support will not only be for research of a diagnostic nature, but will also be for research directed toward means to alleviate and reverse the causes and effects of aging.