The world’s oldest living person Maria Branyas Morera has turned 117 on March 4, 2024. Maria was born in San Francisco before she moved to Spain’s Catalonia when she was eight. She has been in the same nursing home for the past 23 years. Maria won the incredible title of the world’s oldest living person after French nun Lucile Randon died aged 118 in January last year.
The staff of the nursing home says Maria has no physical or mental problems beyond hearing difficulties and challenges related to walking. Maria’s exceptional health at such an age has forced scientists to study her body. Scientist Manel Esteller said: “She has a completely lucid head. She remembers with impressive clarity events from when she was only four years old, and she does not present any cardiovascular (心血管的) disease, common in elderly people. It is clear that there is a genetic component because there are several members of her family who are over 90 years old.”
Maria has agreed to undergo scientific testing by researchers who hope to gain an insight into the secrets to long life. Researchers have collected samples of Maria’s saliva, blood and urine and will compare them with those of her 80-year-old daughter. Scientists hope that studying Maria’s genes will help with the development of drugs which could fight diseases associated with ageing.
Maria has lived through the 1918 pandemic, the two World Wars and Spain’s civil war. She got married in 1931 to a doctor named Joan Moret, with whom she had three children. While her husband passed away in 1976, Maria has lived longer than their only son, August, who died in a tragic tractor accident at the age of 86. She now has two daughters, 11 grandchildren and 11 great-grandchildren.
Maria is now the 12th oldest verified (被认证的) person in history — and will climb to take the fifth spot if she reaches her 118th birthday next year. The oldest person ever was Frenchwoman Jeanne Calment, who lived to the age of 122 years and 164 days.
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