Can the biohackers beat biology?

It sounds like something out of a sci-fi movie, but it’s not. A band of billionaires in Silicon Valley is leaving no stone unturned in their quest for eternal life. They’re using “biohacking,” the process of altering your body’s biology, to stay younger longer and live forever. Netflix captured this gruesome trend with the drama series Biohacker in which a young student (Luna Wedler) discovers a secret lab where an entire town is subjected to sinister experiments. Come, meet the real-life biohackers, the men from Silicon Valley who are chasing immortality.

Peter Thiel – Young Blood

Paypal founder, 53-year-old Peter Thiel, believes injecting adolescent blood can help him live forever. In 2016, a startup called Ambrosia began offering parabiosis (transfusions of young plasma) for £6,000 a pop. “I’m looking into parabiosis stuff, which I think is really interesting. This is where they did the young blood into older mice and they found it had a massive rejuvenating effect,” says Thiel. While it’s unknown whether Thiel went ahead with the treatments, he has admitted to growth hormone injections in the past to slow down the ravages of age. “I stand against the ideology of the inevitability of death,” he says.

Elon Musk – Brain Implants

Tesla boss Elon Musk believes humans will need to transform into cyborgs (half-human, half-robot) if they are to survive the inevitable revolt from AI. Musk has put his money where his mouth is. In July 2019, he ploughed £80 million into Neuralink, a company that’s developing electronic brain implants to connect the human brain to technology. In what sounds like an episode of Black Mirror, the implant will be injected via the bloodstream and will form a mesh around the brain. Once in place, it will allow the person to connect to the internet, control smart devices, and communicate telepathically. Microchip implants are already in use. There’s a camera that can be implanted in the eye, developed by filmmaker Rob Spence. And 3,500 Swedish nationals have had microchips inserted in their bodies that function as contactless rail cards, key cards, and credit cards.

Jack Dorsey – Extreme Temperatures

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey is one of the biggest proponents of biohacking. The 43-year-old gives his brain a boost by alternating between the extreme temperatures in ice baths and saunas. Dorsey starts his day with a sub-zero bath. In the evening, he spends 15 minutes in a 220-degree sauna equipped with an infrared lamp, followed by a 3-minute ice bath. The whole process is repeated three times. “Going into an ice-cold tub from being warm in bed unlocks this thing in my mind and I feel like… I can do nearly anything,” says the social media millionaire. Besides the temperature changes, Dorsey also eats an extremely controlled diet just one meal (chicken, fish, or steak) between 6:30 and 9 in the evening. He reports fasting all weekend on occasion, drinking only water and eating nothing, admitting that the extreme fasting caused hallucinations the first time he tried it. Dorsey sneaks in a couple of hours of meditation before work and walks the 5 miles to his office, where he uses a standing desk, and a SaunaSpace infrared lamp that the manufacturer claims prevents aging.

Ben Greenfield – Rectal Massage

Ben Greenfield, self-styled fitness guru, became a cult figure among biohackers after he performed a range of bizarre experiments on his body, including eating ants (to absorb their energy) and using glass rods to massage his rectum (to promote prostate health). The multi-millionaire had stem cells harvested from his body fat when he was younger. He injects the stored stem cells every six months. “It’s like injecting the young me into the old me,” he says. Talking about a video where he is seen injecting stem cells into his penis to boost his sex life, he says, “I wanted to go from good to great, to get a bigger d***.” There’s nothing too bizarre for Greenfield. He fasts up to 16 hours a day, drinks collagen and bone broth smoothies, uses an essential oil mouthwash, and eats organ meat that he hunts on his 10-acre ranch in Washington with a bow and arrow.

Dave Asprey – Bulletproof Diet

Would you spend £800,000 to live to 180? Dave Asprey, the 46-year-old entrepreneur, did just that to hack his biology. Asprey grew up as a fat kid but lost 100 lbs in his 20s, which he claims upgraded his IQ by 20 points. This led him to develop the Bulletproof Diet, which consists of eating high-fat food and only 35 g of protein a day. The Bulletproof Diet advocates carbohydrates only once a week. And fasting until noon and eating within a narrow 6-hour window daily. Along with a special Bulletproof coffee made from butter, Asprey takes over 100 supplements every day as well as anti-dementia medications, methyl folate and methyl B1-2, all of which he believes will delay aging. Other biohacks Asprey has tried including standing on a vibrating plate, lying under an ultraviolet light for 10 minutes, and spending time in a cryotherapy chamber with temperatures 150 degrees sub-zero. During his daily bike workouts, Asprey wears an oxygen mask to boost energy. He’s also a big proponent of age-defying stem cell therapies. “I’ve had stem cell injections pretty much everywhere in my body,” he says. “I’m only the second person to have stem cell brain injections for preventive reasons,” he adds.

Rich Lee – Headphone Implants

Rich Lee has taken invasive biohacking to the next level. In 2013, the 42-year-old had magnets implanted into his skull to serve as headphones. He’s also had a special armor injected into his lower legs which functions as a built-in shin guard by hardening upon impact. After his divorce in 2016, Lee spent £10,000 to try and turn himself into a human vibrator. He quit his warehouse job to market the Lovetron9000, a device he developed. The Lovetron9000 is implanted in the pelvis and causes the penis to vibrate during sex. “If it started to go mainstream … and you’re the guy at the bar who doesn’t have a Lovetron9000, I think it’s going to suck for you someday,” Lee says.

Serge Fauget – MDMA & Medications

A millionaire in his early 20s, Russian-born tech entrepreneur Serge Fauget has all the money he needs to experiment with biohacking. Fauget spent £140,000 on sleep, nutrition, and diet optimizations using modafinil (a drug used to treat narcolepsy) and MDMA (Ecstasy). “I intend to live forever,” he says. “I don’t want my hair to fall out or to have cancer when I’m 80,” he adds. Some of the biohacks Fauget is experimenting with include a glucose monitor implanted in his belly and a £4,000 hearing aid for perfect sound. He also fasts three times every week and eats only one low-carb meal on the other days, boosting this diet with daily doses of somatropin, a muscle growth hormone. Fauget claims he has never suffered from depression. He pops roughly 60 pills daily, including both natural supplements and prescription antidepressants and mood boosters. Other drugs in his medicine cabinet include metformin (to lower blood sugar), statins (to lower cholesterol), and estrogen blockers (to boost testosterone). Rather than have a conventional relationship, Fauget hires models for sex. And children are out, he says, because they are not a good ROI (return on investment).

Josiah Zaynor – DNA Injections

In October 2017, Josiah Zaynor, former NASA scientist, injected himself with DNA on live stream. He claimed the DNA had been treated with the gene-editing tool, CRISPR, to disable the muscle growth inhibiting hormone myostatin. However, when biohackers caught on to the dangerous trend, Zaynor was regretful. “There’s no doubt in my mind that somebody is going to end up hurt eventually,” he said. Nonetheless, his company, The Odin, did not stop selling the DIY genetic engineering kits. And this wasn’t even the most bizarre biohack Zaynor has tried. A year earlier, he performed a fecal transplant in which he transplanted gut bacteria from a healthy donor into himself.