The Youth Pill: Scientists at the Brink of an Anti-Aging Revolution »

David Stipp is a former senior writer for Fortune and a former staff reporter for The Wall Street Journal, where he covered science, medicine, and technology. In 2006, he wrote a front-page story for The Wall Street Journal that broke the news that resveratrol, and ingredient in red wine, induces anti-aging effects in mice. He lives in Boston.

"After watching elderly mice on resveratrol perform like rodent Olympians in an endurance test, I came away convinced that the long, weird quest to extend life span-a 5,000-year trek during which hopelessly hopeful seekers tried everything from transfusing youths' blood into their aged veins to injecting minced dog testicles-was finally getting somewhere."

Even before the first person set off to find the Fountain of Youth, we've been searching for a way to live longer. But promises of life extension have long reeked of snake oil, and despite our wishful thinking-not to mention the number of vitamins we pop, cups of ginkgo tea we drink, or miles we jog-few of us believe we'll live to see 100, much less set a longevity record.

Scientists, too, have long been skeptical, often dismissing gerontology, the study of aging, as little more than a front for charlatans. And it's hard to blame them. Aging's daunting complexity has often led to more questions than answers, and opportunists have always been quick to cash in on any development, no matter how dubious.

But now we're closing in on true breakthroughs in anti-aging science. Compounds that dramatically extend the health spans and longevity of animals, including mammals, have recently been demonstrated in the lab, and gerontologists now generally agree that drugs that slow human aging and greatly boost health in later life are no longer a distant dream-in fact, candidates supported by reams of data are already at hand.

David Stipp, a veteran science journalist, tells the story of these momentous developments and the scientists behind them. He reveals how seemingly unconnected findings on gene mutations that can double animals' life spans, the life-extending effect of near-starvation diets, the link between dwarfism and longevity, the secrets of weirdly long-lived animals, and the special genes behind human centenarians' radical resistance to the ravages of time are coming together to spark an anti-aging revolution.

Writing for nonscientists, Stipp provides a definitive, engaging account of some of the most exciting, and sometimes controversial, advances that promise to change the way we live forever.

Kirkus Reviews

According to former Wall Street Journal science and technology reporter Stipp, scientists are coming close to achieving the goal of using "the powerful new tools of molecular biology" to "shrink death's dominion."Since the turn of the 20th century, the life expectancy of Americans has increased dramatically, thanks to major improvements in sanitation, decreased infant mortality and the introduction of antibiotics, but only now are gerontologists beginning to make significant headway on the causes of aging. In his intriguing debut, Stipp delves into the story that began in the 1930s with the discovery that a calorie-restricted diet increases life expectancy, and continues with the current effort to develop safe drugs that will mimic the effect of a CR diet. The author begins with his 2006 WSJ front-page story about how daily doses of resveratrol, found in red wine, not only protected rodents from the effects of a devastatingly rich diet, but apparently rejuvenated them. Add to this the fact that a genetic mutation causing dwarfism, which suppresses growth hormones, is also a life extender, and the basis for a new comprehensive theory is emerging. A group of genes that normally control the production of cell proteins can be switched to activate cell-repair mechanisms, causing them to absorb the "accumulation of harmful crud . . . thought to play a major role in aging." Scientists have now established that the rate of aging in widely diverse organisms is not only amazingly plastic but controllable. The same CR mimetic drugs that are being developed to ward off the ravages of old age can also help counter the effects of obesity. To rival the advances of the 20th century in increased life-expectancy, Stipp estimates that the federal government will need to launch a federal program on par with the 1960s Apollo project. "Sadly," he writes, "comparative gerontology . . . has long been one of biomedicine's poor cousins. Indeed, it's arguable that most of the lines of research covered in this book are lamentably underfunded."Though increased funding will be difficult to come by, Stipp makes a convincing argument for more widespread anti-aging research. Agent: Lisa Adams/The Garamond Agency