Comparative and age-associated biochemistry and physiology, particularly 

 the age-associated changes in the gradient of intestinal automatism, the physiol- 

 ogy of the skeletal musculature, the trophic influence of the nervous system, and 

 a number of problems of embryo-chemistry have been studied (and are still 

 being studied) by Kh. S. Koshtoyants (1931-1954) and his coworkers (R. L. 

 Mitropolitanskaya, A. M. Ryabinovskaya, G. A. Buznikov, V. A. Muzikantov, 

 and others). In this connecdon, they have paid particular attention to the 

 comparative physiology and biochemistry of amphibians, fish, and some inverte- 

 brates (Bombyx mori). 



M. S. Mil'man's investigadons (1900-1940) were of special interest in the 

 field of Russian age-linked physiology. On the basis of a large group of ana- 

 tomical and histological findings, Mil'man advanced his theory of aging as 

 being the result of atrophy from starvadon (food, oxygen, and neurotic). 

 According to Mil'man, starvadon of cells (and especially of their central nuclei) 

 is the result of their growth. In the cell, "the position of the peripheral particles 

 [tr.: molecules?] is more favorable: they can receive more substances for as- 

 similation than can the central ones. The result of this is an unequal growth of 

 the external and internal parts. . . . The protoplasm is more favorably situated 

 with respect to the surface, i.e., to the source of food, than is the nucleus, and 

 for this reason the latter, in the course of growth, reveals signs of starvation 

 and atrophy earlier than does the protoplasm." 



The growth of cells brings with it, according to Mil'man, a whole series of 

 "bioreducdve processes": (a) changes in their size and shape; (b) changes in 

 structure and chemical composiuon; (c) displacement of the protoplasm by 

 metaplasmatic formations; (d) death of the cells. 



"Consequently, the growdi of the cells gives rise not only mechanically to 

 arrest and regression of growth but also chemically: nutritional deficiences 

 and autointoxication, accumulating, bring about the death of the cells of the 

 organism . . . The organ cannot atrophy if it is fed properly" (M. S. Mil'man). 



In the multicellular organism, the conditions of tissue nutrition are still 

 worse, and especially those of its centrally situated cell groups: "With an in- 

 crease in the number of cells, the vessels are unable to reach every cell, for the 

 simple reason that they can grow only in two spatial directions, whereas the 

 mass of the cell grows in three directions." 



Hence Mil'man regards as bioreductive phenomena the differentiation of 

 nuclei in cells, cell division, dssue differentiadon, and the growth of extracellular 

 masses and connective tissue, and it is to these that he ascribes the age-linked 

 arrest of the organism's growth and its subsequent death. ". . . Aging begins 

 very early, even with the first cell division, with the first manifestation of life. 

 The concept of life also includes that of aging ... In its first mulUplication, the 

 cell creates an obstacle to its nutrition. With each division, these obstacles in- 

 crease. Growth depends on nutrition, and continuously digs its own grave." 



"The severe worsening of the nervous system's nutrition with increasing 

 age leads to its premature atrophy, and this brings with it the early death of the 

 entire organism as a result of impaired nutrition of the tissues." Although the 

 first cause of starvadon of the cells is to be found in the conditions of its growth, 



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