Greetings,

My name is Robert Douglas Young and as the World's Leading Expert in Maximum Human Lifespan, having been tasked with writing the encyclopedia article for this topic for the United Nations, I am pleased to announce that I have signed up to check out the Global Supercentenarian Forum, which I presume is a place where the main focus is "Global" (Worldwide); "Supercentenarian" (110+); and "Forum" (a place for OPEN discussion). As such, I believe this fits within my purview of interest in supercentenarians, which for me began in 1979 when I saw a news report about an extremely elderly woman in Georgia celebrating her "109th" birthday (I would like to point out that we now consider someone age 109 to be semi-supercentenarian...almost supercentenarian).

I am also the Senior Consultant for Gerontology for Guinness World Records since 2005 and the Director of the Gerontology Research Group-Supercentenarian Research and Database Division since 2015. I also coined the term "supercentenarian database" and wrote the first encyclopedia article on this, also for the United Nations.

Though I was born in the United States, my Mother is born in Europe and I have travelled extensively worldwide, including to Europe, Asia, Latin America, and the Caribbean. One of my interests is to focus on the GLOBAL since we have data that strongly suggest that from a biological standpoint the maximum human lifespan is set by biological factors first and foremost, and then moderated by environment as subtractions for the hypothetical maximum. As such I am pleased that multiple organizations are continuing to develop along the lines of scientific principles in the study of supercentenarians and the maximum human lifespan. For example, we know the gender ratio of 9 females per 1 male is generally close to the same globally, and the mortality rate at age 110 is close to .5 annual risk of death across the globe. These are good signs because it really means we are all human, with a lot more similarities than differences.

I would have more to say but I need to cut here for time and I will resume my introduction as time allows.

Thank you.