It doesn't live forever. When it reverts back to it's juvenile state it ends up cloning itself.
The article did state that the organism can reproduce asexually at the polyp stage, but my understanding is that this is not the basis of its “immortality”. Rather, it’s the ability of the jellyfish cells to “transdifferentiate” (although I think a better term is “dedifferentiate”). This is an amazing property that is very rare in animal cells, although common in plant cells.
So do you think there is a good secret locked in this little buggers DNA code?
There is a lot of scientific research on the mechanisms of aging. Findings like this jellyfish are interesting, but there is a big difference between the genetics of aging in ‘simple’ organisms versus ‘complex’ organisms. In
Drosophila and
C.elegans (two of the workhorse model organisms in genetics and developmental biology), it is easy to alter lifespan. Alteration of single genes can dramatically change lifespan in one direction or the other. However, when the same alterations are made in mice there is little or no effect. This reflects the considerably more complex genetic and epigenetic factors controlling aging in mammals.
However, the ability to stimulate our own cells to dedifferentiate holds tremendous potential in the areas of regenerative therapies. This is evidenced by the recent IPS breakthrough. This is where scientists have managed to coax human adult differentiated cells (eg. a skin cell) to dedifferentiate into embryonic stem cell-like cells. It is hoped that these
Induced
Pluripotent
Stem (IPS) cells will be a readily available patient-matched alternative to using embryonic stem cells in cellular therapies for degenerative diseases.
Applying dedifferentiation to increasing human lifespan or reducing the effects of aging is a considerably more speculative and long-term goal!
