Welcome to my website on gerontology and longevity. Here, I cover three main topics: longevity, oldest people, and last survivors. The main purpose of this site is to function as a web-book whose content is centered around the aforementioned topics.
How this site is intended to be read:
This site is divided into several sections, and each section consists of articles as well as lists. Some sections which cover multiple related topics are further divided into sub-sections. The first section ... The second section ... As for the order, I am still deciding which order the sections should be read, but I would recommend that the first two sections should be read first, before the other three sections, but those other three sections can be read in pretty much whatever order you'd like.
Why I made this site:
There's actually already an entire wiki dedicated to gerontology, so why make this site? Gerontology Wiki, the wiki on gerontology and longevity, does a great job covering these topics, but I still chose to make this site for two main reasons: (1) I aim to give my own specific insight into these subjects and individuals, and (2) I want to cover content in a way that's accessible for beginners. Also, the company that hosts Gerontology Wiki, Fandom (formerly Wikia) has become more corporate in general and has done several things to the detriment of users, such as distracting ads in webpages. In addition, I have not been able to find any sites hosted on Google Sites with serious coverages of all three of the above-mentioned topics, so I have decided to create my own.
Longevity is a field based on long lives made by long-lived people. Certain people have lived to at least 100 (these people are called centenarians) but only about 0.1% of them become a supercentenarian (age 110+ years). The Gerontology Research Group -- abbreviated as GRG -- validates longevity records and maintains a list of supercentenarians; there are many other examples of longevity claims which remain unverified. There are two record-holding individuals that I think are most important to mention here:
Jeanne Calment (1875–1997 (122 years, 164 days)) - the oldest person in history whose age has been verified by modern documentation.
Jiroemon Kimura (1897–2013 (116 years, 54 days)) - the oldest man in history whose age has been verified by modern documentation.
For other people who have claimed ages between 110 - 130 please see my section on longevity claims (Gerontology Wiki: Longevity claims). And for other people with claimed ages above 130 these are separately listed at longevity myths (Gerontology Wiki: Longevity myths).
Studies based on evidence have shown that longevity is based on two major factors: genetics and lifestyle.
That's just about all I have to say for my site's introduction. Go back to the home page to start navigating this site.