Ageing as a fundamental mechanism of living matter adaptation and development

Introduction. The ageing biology is in crisis now. Old principles of creating conceptual models in ageing research were limited to idealization of certain observed phenomena and particular mechanisms of ageing but they proved to be invalid. The objective of the study is to conduct conceptual analysis of living matter ageing process as a basic mechanism of living organism adaptation and development. Materials and Methods. Logical methods, analysis, synthesis, abstraction, generalization, and hypothesizing are applied. Results and Dicussion. It was proved that ageing and development is a complex continuous process. It is the ageing process that defines the integrated development of life on the Earth. Self-organization processes are universal in the physical world and they are the main motive for development. The evolution itself is based on a global metabolism, energy and information. Creating the structure of a higher level is impossible without the elimination of less perfect forms with the subsequent use of their constituents in the further development. This elimination can occur only through the mechanisms of ageing and death. In the process of ageing structural body elements take certain steps towards its structural development. This biological information is transmitted by genetic and nutritional pathways to newly emerging living organisms. This process continuously improves integral structural and functional quality of living matter, increases its stability and adaptability to the environment. Conclusion. Based on analysis of literature data and on personal logical outputs, the authors suggest the following definition of the ageing phenomenon: ageing is a process of continuous transformation of living matter, when the organisms generate and archive evolutionarily effective structures of protein molecules in order to improve their own adaptive resources and transfer these structures into biosphere as reference material for further qualitative development of living matter.