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Longevity & Ageing · Recorded milestone

Hayflick limit

Recorded year1961

Leonard Hayflick finds human cells divide only about 50 times.

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Built on

HeLa, the first immortal human cellsRecorded · 1951enables

Led to

Telomerase discoveredRecorded · 1984enables
Senolytic drugsRecorded · 2015enables

Sources & evidence

Additional source

Dataset updated 2026-10-18. This individual record has not been separately re-reviewed.