ИСТИНА

HUMANITY HAS BEEN searching for the elixir of eternal youth ever since Adam and Eve were banished from paradise to prevent them eating from the Tree of Life. Had they munched on that elusive fruit instead of an apple from the Tree of Knowledge, they would have found themselves living forever. The ancient Greeks longed for ambrosia, the so-called nectar of the gods. Ancient Egyptians interred their mummified dead with provisions for an expected literal journey to the afterlife. European alchemists in the Middle Ages tried to distil the philosophers’ stone, which carried the promise of immortality. And only a few years ago, Russian scientists injected mice with 3.5-million-year-old bacteria found in the Siberian permafrost in an attempt to prolong the rodents’ lives. They reported that the elderly mice – grandmothers in the generational scheme of things – not only began to dance, but also produced viable offspring. One scientist, Anatoli Brouchkov, head of the geocryology department at Moscow State University, was so enamoured by this project that he even injected himself: two years later he claimed to be healthier than ever – but time will tell. There is a long history of people purporting to have found such miraculous substances, who have nonetheless dropped dead afterwards.