The error catastrophe hypothesis and aging.

A theory of the propagation of errors in the system of enzymes translating genetic information into proteins developed earlier is extended to include errors at the transcription level. The theory is compared to other statistical theories. The properties are defined of the protein synthesizing machineries, especially those of the erroneous enzymes, which give catastrophe, stable self-replication containing errors, recovery from errors, etc. Experimental data are analyzed in light of the theory to determine the validity of the error catastrophe hypothesis of aging.