ºÙºÙÊÓƵ

* Jan. 24, Tuesday, and Jan. 25, Wednesday -- Not long ago, aging was viewed as an inevitable process of the body wearing out. But in 1993, Cynthia Kenyon discovered that a single genetic change could double the lifespan of the soil roundworm Caenorhabditis elegans, sparking intense new interest in the molecular biology of aging. Kenyon's work has shown that aging in the worm is regulated by hormonal pathways that have counterparts in humans. By manipulating genes and cells, she has been able to extend the lifespan and period of youthfulness in worms up to six-fold. Kenyon will give a public lecture, "Genes From the Fountain of Youth," at 4:10 p.m. on Tuesday, Jan. 24, and a scientific lecture, "Mechanisms of Lifespan Regulation in C. elegans," at 12:10 p.m. on Wednesday, Jan. 25. Both lectures will be held in room 170 Schalm Hall on the ºÙºÙÊÓƵ campus and are free and open to the public. Kenyon is an American Cancer Society Professor and former Herbert Boyer Distinguished Professor of Biochemistry and Biophysics at UC San Francisco, and director of the UCSF Hillblom Center for the Biology of Aging. Her work has been widely reported in the media and featured in the PBS series Scientific American Frontiers. Her talks are part of the Tracy and Ruth Storer Lectureship in the Life Sciences, established in 1960 for the purpose of bringing eminent biologists from other institutions to participate in the academic community of ºÙºÙÊÓƵ.