Jeff Bezos Funds Research To Find Longevity Recipes

JAKARTA - Amazon founder Jeff Bezos is reportedly backing a Silicon Valley startup called Altos Labs dedicated to finding ways to reverse the aging process. While it may sound like a joke at first, this company's anti-aging research has received funding from many wealthy individuals.

Altos Labs, a biological reprogramming technology company, reportedly has big names coming to its aid such as Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos and Russian-Israeli billionaire Yuri Milner. The company recruits top scientists from around the world with salaries as high as $1 million and promises they can continue their own research on anti-aging and how to reverse the aging process of cells.

The people who join the research are sure to catch everyone's attention. Juan Carlos Izpisúa Belmonte, a biologist at the Salk Institute in La Jolla, California is one of many scientists who will be working with Altos Labs.

In addition, Nobel Prize-winning scientist Shinya Yamanaka will also be part of Altos' scientific advisory board. He won the Nobel Prize for his research on reversing aging in cells.

To rejuvenate cells, a method known as biological reprogramming is used which can open the door to immortality. While many startups are working on biological reprogramming, none of them have managed to get funding like Altos Labs did.

Bezos' Love For Long Research

Bezos is currently 57 years old and is also the richest person in the world with a net worth of around $201 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. He has long been interested in longevity research. The billionaire previously invested in an anti-aging company called Unity Biotechnology.

While MIT Technology Research could not confirm Bezos' ownership of Altos, what is certain is that he knows his age. This ideology is also reflected in his final letter to Amazon shareholders, in which he quotes biologist Richard Dawkins: "Preventing death is something you have to work on... If living things don't actively work to prevent it, they will eventually merge with the environment. them and cease to exist as autonomous beings. That's what happens when they die".

What Bezos is showing here is that nations, companies, and people must strive to remain different and unique. Going back in time to your youth can be one way to achieve this.

Can Money Buy You Time?

Well, it's no surprise that billionaires are in the first place to bet on something that will keep them alive as long as possible. However, it remains unclear exactly how Altos Labs is trying to achieve this and how they will get there.

Additionally, the MIT Technology Review reports that there will be no deadline for the researchers. Instead, the company aims to create "great science." So right now, Altos Labs is still a mystery, and the only reason it's getting big funding is a simple fact that nobody wants to die. But how to achieve immortality is the question.

Perhaps the more haunting question is who gains access to this technology after scientists crack the code?