Professor Vladyslav Vyazovskiy speaks at Braemar Summit 2024

Professor Vladyslav Vyazovskiy speaks at Braemar Summit 2024

Last week Professor Vyazovskiy attended Braemar summit Braemar Summit - a unique gathering of scientists,  entrepreneurs, journalists, artists, politicians and policy makers, organised annually in September by Sarah Sands, former Editor of BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, and Roger Highfield, Science Director of the Science Museum. The usual program of the summit is a series of talks and panel sessions moderated by journalists, and plenty of time for networking and serendipitous conversations.

The main topics for Braemar 2024 included medical breakthroughs, longevity, climate, AI, upcoming US presidential elections and wars in the Middle East and Ukraine. As usual, the meeting featured a diverse community of participants – from a Nobel prize winning scientist Venki Ramakrishnan and Former Executive Vice President at AstraZeneca, Professor Bobby Gaspa to the former President of the Royal Society Lord Rees and Director of the Natural History Museum Douglas Gurr, from Professor of Global History Peter Frankopan and CEO of Atlantic Productions Anthony Geffen to the Former Chancellor of the Exchequer Jeremy Hunt, Former Foreign Secretary David Miliband and Former Director General of MI5 Baroness Manningham-Buller.

Professor Vyazovskiy was invited to speak at the panel  “Longevity and Society”, alongside several distinguished speakers including Vice Chancellor of Cambridge University Professor Deborah Prentice and co-founder of Juvenescence, entrepreneur and investor Jim Mellon. The discussion revolved around recent scientific developments and challenges in extending "healthspan", entrepreneurship in this area and implications of ageing and dementia for economy and healthcare system. Professor Vyazovskiy talked about sleep, which is a state occupying 1/3 of human life, and thought to be essential if not crucial for a broad range of restorative processes of various kinds, and for this reason a promising target for longevity research. He discussed how sleep changes with age, highlighted some theories for sleep functions relevant for longevity, discussed evolution of sleep and ageing, and of course talked about his favourite subject – hibernation, which is a state of suspended animation when ageing effectively stops for good.

Overall, this meeting provided a unique opportunity to meet experts, thought leaders  and just very interesting people, establish new contacts and potential collaborations. The spirit of Braemar summit is to provide a platform where science meets society, creating new ideas and potential solutions for the big challenges of the modern times.