Gerontology Research Group

The Gerontology Research Group (GRG) was started in either 1990 or 1992, and is a group of researchers in gerontology who meet monthly at UCLA in Los Angeles, California. [cite news |first= |last= |authorlink= |coauthors= |title=Odds of reaching 100 get better. |url= |quote=... according to The Gerontology Research Group, a nonprofit volunteer organization ... |publisher=Pittsburgh Tribune Review |date=June 1, 2006 |accessdate=2007-10-31 ] cite news |first= |last= |authorlink= |coauthors= |title=Research group tracks oldest-living people. |url=http://www.dailybruin.ucla.edu/archives/id/29038/ |quote=They are searching for an alternate route to immortality other than the fountain of youth. ... The group works closely with the Guinness Book of World Records and is now considered the primary source for verifying the world’s oldest person for the annual records’ book. ... Coles added that about a year ago, the Guinness Book began to recognize the group as the primary source for verifying the ages of people. |publisher=Daily Bruin |date=June 10, 2004 |accessdate=2007-10-31 ] The group tracks people over the age of 110. [cite news |first= |last= |authorlink= |coauthors= |title=The 100+ club |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/4207850.stm |quote= The term applies to anyone older than 110 and, according to the US Gerontology Research Group, there are 68 supercentenarians in the world today. None of them were born in the UK - Ms d'Abreu was born in India. |publisher=BBC |date=2 September 2005 |accessdate=2007-10-31 ] [cite news |first= |last= |authorlink= |coauthors= |title=One of oldest Portuguese women, 110, dies. |url=http://www.modbee.com/local/story/116387.html |quote=... according to the Gerontology Research Group. Mrs. Sanders spent the last decade of her life at the La Sierra Care Center in Merced, ... |publisher=Modesto Bee |date=November 9, 2007 |accessdate=2007-10-31 ] The group was co-founded by L. Stephen Coles who is the Director and Treasurer of the Supercentenarian Research Foundation.cite web |url=http://www.grg.org/ |title= Supercentenarian Research Foundation |accessdate=2007-10-31 |quote=L. Stephen Coles, M.D., Ph.D., Director and Treasurer of the Supercentenarian Research Foundation |publisher=Gerontology Research Group ] [cite news |first= |last= |authorlink= |coauthors= |title=Researchers Work to Crack Code of Long Life |url=http://www.webmd.com/medicare/news/20040521/researchers-long-life |quote=People don't live to be 110 "because they don't age; it's a fortuitous, genetic roll of the dice, so there is not an intervention available to people who are still alive," says L. Stephen Coles, MD, PhD, a gerontologist with the Los Angeles Gerontology Research Group at UCLA.|publisher=Web MD |date= |accessdate=2007-10-31 ] The other co-founder was Steven M. Kaye.cite news |first=Steven M. |last=Kaye |authorlink= |coauthors= |title=General Concepts for Directions to Proceed with the 21st Century Biotechnology Group. |url=http://www.jvp.com/news.html |quote=Much of the philosophy and technological developments described above, have come from the doctors and scientists participating in the Gerontological Research Group in Los Angeles. Gerontological Research, co-founded in 1992 by Steven M. Kaye, MD and Stephen Coles, MD, PhD., has become a "Rand Corporation" think tank for life extension research and development. The JVP Venture Fund Biotechnology Group has full access to the world’s most advanced thinking, and visionary medical scientists. |publisher=Joint Venture Partners |date= |accessdate=2007-10-31 ] Editions of the "Guinness World Records" through the year 2008 indicate that the Gerontology Research Group is used as its authority for its "World's Oldest Living People" category, which the group verifies using birth and marriage certificates. [cite book |title="Guinness World Records 2008" |year=2008 |pages=p. 67 |publisher= |isbn=1-904994-19-9] [cite news |first=Jeffrey |last=Zaslow |authorlink=Jeffrey Zaslow |coauthors= |title=Gerontology sleuths search for 'supercentenarians' |url=http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05059/463487.stm |quote=Her ripe old age was "a falsehood perpetrated by the tourism industry there," says GRG co-founder L. Stephen Coles, a physician and stem-cell researcher at UCLA's David Geffen School of Medicine, where GRG is based. GRG counts just 12 undisputed cases of people ever reaching 115. ... The 14-year-old GRG, which the Guinness World Records Book now relies on to confirm longevity records. ...|publisher=Pittsburgh Post-Gazette |work=Wall Street Journal |accessdate=2007-10-31 | date=February 28, 2005 ] cite news |first= |last= |authorlink= |coauthors= |title=Researchers are studying what causes some people -- such as two OC... |url= |quote=Coles is co-founder of the Los Angeles Gerontology Research Group, which verifies supercentenarian ages for Guinness world Records using birth and marriage ... |publisher=Orange County Register |date=August 3, 2004 |accessdate=2007-10-31 ] The New York Times wrote that the GRG has been recognized as "an authority on the matter" of verifying supercentenarians. [cite news |first= |last= |authorlink= |coauthors= |title=In Connecticut, World’s Oldest Woman Dies at 114. |url=http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/30/nyregion/30old.html?_r=1&oref=slogin |quote=In the last month alone, the title of oldest person has changed hands three times, according to the Gerontology Research Group, an authority on the matter. 'The Guinness Book of World Records will not be able to keep up,' said Dr. L. Stephen Coles of the University of California, Los Angeles, the executive director of the group. 'This has been a pretty volatile time. Usually we’ve had a more stable No. 1 position.' |publisher=New York Times |date=January 30, 2007 |accessdate=2007-11-16 ] The group started as an organization to investigate the limits of life spans in all mammalian species, and around 1998–1999 they started a committee to investigate claims to find out who was the oldest living person at any point in time. As of date, the organization is monitoring 80 people whom they have validated as living supercentenarians, 71 women and 9 men.

Members

Current membership in the GRG includes:
* Hubert Warner [ [http://www.springerlink.com/content/0375842384108n15/ SpringerLink - Journal Article ] ]
* Leonid Gavrilov (University of Chicago) [ [http://www.longevity-science.org/ Longevity Science: Unraveling the Secrets of Human Longevity & Aging ] ]

ee also

* List of the oldest people
* Longevity
* Longevity claims
* Longevity myths
* Oldest people
* Supercentenarian
* Extreme longevity tracking

References

External links

* [http://www.grg.org Official site]