Cells can divide far more than 50 times before they run out of telomeres, the telomeres are massive, thousands of nucleotides long. The telomerase enzyme is only expressed in the fetus and immortal cells, primarily the germ cells and cancer.Yudas said:Many theories involve the DNA. We have a protein in our cell called telomerase, that makes sure our DNA is big as needed after each cell division. This is needed because a small amount of DNA is lost after each division, and without telomerase this won't be regained. This only works in some of our cells, and those who doesnt have it, will only be able to divide themselves for a set amount of times (around 50.)
Over the years we accumulute mutations in our DNA. We have 3.2 DNA molecules in our genome, and for each cell division a few will be wrongly copied. This can lead to cancer, or to the decline in cell functionality which might cause aging.
3.2 DNA molecules? This makes absolutely no sense. Not sure how big you think a DNA molecule is (neither an I to be honest, DNA is rarely referred to in molecules), but given that we have 46 individual chromosomes in our genome, the figure of 3.2 is ludicrous.
I'm sorry, but none of the terminology you used is correct. Transposons are involved in transporting sections of DNA between individual chromosomes and have no role in DNA replication. Centromeres hold the pairs of chromosomes together and have a structural role in cell replication as part of the spindle, getting each copy of the DNA to opposite ends of the cell for when it divides. DNA does not contains peptides, and at no point in DNA replication are nucleotides dephosphorylated (the loss of phosphate groups). Instead the strand loses some nucleotides, in their entirety.Ozzythecat said:Because as thing grow and age the clones of your cells degrade with every batch, this is due to the fact transposons and centromeres occasionally "lose" a peptide or some phosphate groups are lost, so mainly as your cells essentially clone themselves the degradation carries down the line, until the degradation causes dangerous defects and mutations. There more to it but I don't know the exact specifics and I'm too lazy to type them anyway.