The first statement was that – and I think I can quote this pretty accurately – as anyone who has worked with cell culture will know, that cells cultured under the proper milieu in vitro will replicate indefinitely, which was precisely the dogma that we had thought we had torpedoed.
The next paragraph said: 'The suggestion that these events have anything to do with ageing is notably rash', end quote. The letter was signed by Peyton Rous, R O U S. Peyton Rous received the Nobel prize two years after our paper was rejected over his signature. He was well known and a well respected scientist. He not only discovered the Rous sarcoma virus, a virus of chickens that produces tumours, he also was the first to describe trypsin as an enzyme useful in cell culture and his description of trypsin lay unrecognised in the literature for about 15 years before it finally became rediscovered as a useful enzyme.
Well, that was a shock. Paul and I were pretty upset. The paper was lengthy and it described things in great detail and here we were faced with this rejection.
