Human Longevity

This absorbing, balanced account of human longevity draws together information from the fields of medicine, biology, demography, epidemiology, gerontology, and sociology. It describes the history and present status of human longevity and deals in logical sequence with the questions this subject raises. The book illustrates how life expectancy has increased in most countries due, in part, to changing causes of death. It examines the biological determinants of longevity and analyzes social and behavioral factors that may reduce longevity. The book covers the reasons why women live longer than men. It asks why the maximum human life span is nearly twice that of any other warm-blooded animal and much longer than required for reproductive success, and it discusses factors that were involved in the evolution of longevity. It presents predictable increases in human life expectancy and explores the possibility that the maximum human life expectancy may become even longer. Accessible, comprehensive, and original, this book provides a multidisciplinary synthesis of ideas and conclusions about human longevity. It will have wide appeal to professionals in the many areas concerned with longevity as well as lay readers.

This book contains black-and-white illustrations.

David W.E. Smith, M.D., is a professor in the Department of Pathology and the Buehler Center on Aging at Northwestern University. He was trained in pathology at Yale University and did research at the National Institutes of Health. Most of his career has been spent studying the molecular biology of translation - the involvement of tRNA molecules in hemoglobin synthesis. In 1987 he organized a conference of the National Institute on Aging about why women live longer than men, and his principal interest since that time has been human longevity.