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More men live past 100 on this Italian island, proportionally, than anywhere else, it appears. Scientists are now trying to explain why
SASSARI, ITALY-When Antonio Todde celebrated his 112th birthday on 22 January in the tiny village of Tiana in the Sardinian mountains, among the hundreds of pilgrims who journeyed to the frail shepherd's house to wish him akentannos-congratulations for living to a century-were a half-dozen Italian scientists and a Belgian demographer. The hairpin turns on the narrow road into Tiana may have given the longevity researchers gray hairs, but the harrowing trip was worth it. Nowhere else in the world, they believe, does a larger proportion of men survive to the ripe old age of 100 than on this sunny Mediterranean island. Todde-the world's oldest living man, according to The Guinness Book of World Records-and his long-- lived Sardinian brethren could hold clues to the secrets of long life.
In countries with reliable data five women reach the century mark for every man who reaches this milestone. Two years ago, researchers here at the University of Sassari found that on Sardinia, the female-male centenarian ratio is only about two to one. And in Sardinia's mountainous interior, there are roughly equal numbers of 100-- year-old men and women. "The proportion is remarkable," says Claudio Franceschi, Italy's leading centenarian researcher and an immunologist at the University of Bologna-which, as the world's oldest university, is a fitting venue for longevity research. Because relatively few people have moved to Sardinia's villages, he says, the island's genetic isolation makes it "a perfect place to pursue research into complex traits such as longevity."
Whereas many past claims of extreme male longevity around the world have withered under scrutiny, the Sardinia data appear to be holding up. That's why researchers are now beating a path to Todde's door, and to many other homes in the Sardinian uplands, to take blood samples and quiz the centenarians about their genealogies and lifestyles. A clear explanation for what sets these men apart has not yet emerged, but there are hints that genetic factors-perhaps even inbreeding-may play a role. "Centenarians are the pioneers on the frontiers of survival," says James W Vaupel, director of the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research in Rostock, Germany....