MORTALITY COMBAT!

NEW year, new you - 2026 has arrived and most of us will have made half-hearted promises to lead cleaner, healthier lives. But some folk go to the extreme in an effort to beat the ever-ticking clock, even attempting to achieve immortality. Peter Pan man TOM STICHBURY - whose youthful appearance is the result of salmon sperm facials - tracks down fascinating figures who tried, or are trying, to find the secret to eternal life...

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Mercury rising: More than 2,200 years ago, Qin Shi Huang - the first Chinese emperor - tasked his subjects to uncover the elixir of life.

His quest led him to consume cinnabar, made up of mercury sulfide, in a desperate bid to live longer. By no means a winning - or Qin-ing formula, this might be what killed t h e emperor, below right, in the end at the age of 49. Irony has never been so cruel.