STUDIES ON ADAPTATION AS A METHOD 

 OF GERONTOLOGICAL RESEARCH 



F. Verzar 



Physiological Institute, University of Basle 



Since the present conference is to deal with "methods" of 

 gerontological research, I wish first to explain why we have 

 chosen for our method of attack the study of changes in 

 adaptation which occur with increasing age throughout the 

 individual's life. 



The word "adaptation" has been much misused in recent 

 years, as if it depended upon the special activity of one 

 endocrine gland only. It cannot be emphasized strongly 

 enough that such a concept is a misunderstanding of the 

 fact that "adaptation is the general capacity of living organ- 

 isms to live under continuously changing conditions". In 

 fact, the adaptation capacity of fluent metabolic equilibria is 

 probably the best characterization which can be given for 

 "life". When this adaptability decreases, ageing begins. 



This viewpoint may bring us into conflict with the idea that 

 ageing starts with conception or, as others like to say, with 

 birth. No doubt there are retrograde cell processes even in the 

 embryo, but they are changes in the ontogenetic evolution, 

 which are not a decrease in adaptability. On the contrary, 

 evolution means increasing adaptation to changes in condi- 

 tions of life. When the human embryo loses its gills and tail, it 

 has recapitulated a part of its adaptation from former genera- 

 tions to a completely changed evolutionary period. 



Birth is in fact the greatest adaptation process, when 

 foetal respiration, circulation and nutrition have suddenly, 

 in minutes or hours, to be transformed to meet completely 

 new life conditions. Thus, even if we see that the placenta 

 and the umbilical cord show histological degenerative changes, 



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