Following on the post immediately below, "ChatBots: "OpenAI annualized revenue tops $1.6 billion..." Figures That's Good For Another Funding Round At $100 Billion Valuation".
From Futurism, December 19:
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has invested a whopping $180 million in a startup called Retro Biosciences that's looking for novel ways to extend human longevity.
As Bloomberg reports, the company has an unusual way of exploring new treatments: it's investigating not just one area of research, but five — an extremely costly and high-risk approach in the world of anti-aging science.
Altman, who recently was fired and promptly reinstated at OpenAI, gave Retro cofounder Joe Betts-LaCroix an immense opportunity.
"Sam was willing to do something different and throw lots of money at a bunch of things in parallel," Betts-LaCroix told Bloomberg, referring to his support as "freaking awesome" and "cool."
But considering the sheer risks involved, we're unlikely to see potential life extension research being tried out on humans any time soon.
Case in point, one avenue of research being investigated by Retro Biosciences is reprogramming damaged or decayed cells to revert them to a healthier and younger state.
However, researchers have run into some serious roadblocks when trying the process out on lab mice. In some experiments, mice that had some of their genes reprogrammed, started growing tumors called teratomas, which can be made up of several different types of tissue, including hair, bone, or teeth.
"There’s thinking that you can inject a virus that will go into someone’s tissues, put the genes for these transcription factors into the cells and express them for a while in hopefully a very controlled way," Betts-LaCroix told Bloomberg....
....MUCH MORE
