On Premature Cellular Senescence
How much of degenerative aging is due to the acculumation of senescent, no longer functioning cells? More in some tissues than others, such as skin, it seems. "Cellular senescence is considered an essential contributor to the aging process and has been shown to be an important tumor suppression mechanism. In addition, emerging evidence suggests that senescence may also be involved in the pathogenesis of stem cell dysfunction and chronic human diseases. Under these circumstances cells undergo stress-induced premature senescence, which has several specific features." As this review paper points out, developing a technology to turn off programmed senescence would simply result in much more cancer - the process serves an important purpose in shutting down potentially dangerous cells. The problem needs a better solution, more likely focused on convincing the body to recycle these cells rather than leaving them to degrade the performance of tissue.
Link: http://ajpheart.physiology.org/cgi/content/abstract/290/5/H1729