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Humans could be about to discover how to live for centuries after scientists discovered how to slow down and even stop the ageing process.

Researchers at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies managed to slow down the ageing process in mouse cells.

This extended the life of a mouse with an accelerated ageing condition, and slowed down ageing in a middle aged mouse.

Treatment to the middle aged mouse's muscles and pancreas extended its life by 30%.

David Sinclair, a Harvard University geneticist and anti-ageing researcher, said: "This is the first glimmer that we could live for centuries.

"47 years went by pretty quickly."

The process would reverse cells being and muscles being aged by smoking, pollution, or environmental changes.

Juan Carlos Izpisua Belmonte, the study’s senior author and an expert in gene expression, said: "Ageing is something plastic that we can manipulate.”

(Image: Getty Images)

Scientists are hopeful the treatment, re-programming epigenetics, could work on mice and humans at any age.

Another study author, Alejandro Ocampo, is hopeful the treatment could be used for people 100-years-old or more.

However, the not all of the rodents fared well when they were subjected to the treatment.

When researchers treated some mice continually, they developed tumours and died within a week.

Mr Sinclair added: "We've all been playing with fire. This is going to be what we spend the next 10 years figuring out.

"How to re-programme cells to be young again without taking it to far so they become tumours.

"This is not just a matter of how long we can live, but how well we can live the rest of our life."

This is by far from the first miracle anti-ageing method to hit the news this year.

Scientists claimed to have discovered a miracle anti ageing drug from a mix of growth hormones and diabetes medicine.