Healthy lifestyle slows cell aging

Longer young through a healthy lifestyle

09/18/2013

A healthy lifestyle can slow down cell aging. This was the result of a US study in which 35 men were accompanied over a five-year period. The investigations showed that the so-called telomeres, which protect the genome in cell divisions and whose length is an indication of the lifespan of the cell, were significantly longer in the study participants, who ate healthy food and daily completed a moderate exercise program.

Counteract cell aging with a healthy lifestyle
A healthy lifestyle not only prevents certain diseases but can also slow down the aging of cells. This was the conclusion reached by US researchers around the lead author of the Dean Ornish study at the University of California, San Francisco, in an unprecedented study that involved a total of 35 men over five years. Ten of the subjects should live very healthy. This included a balanced diet with plenty of fruits and vegetables and whole foods and daily light exercise, yoga and stress management. The other 25 men served as a control group. They should not change their food and eating habits.

To investigate evidence of the effects of lifestyle, researchers looked at certain protein structures, called telomeres, which are located at the end of the chromosomes and protect the genome during cell division. The longer the telomeres are, the more „younger“ the cell is valid.

„When the data from the two groups were summarized, it was shown that adherence to lifestyle changes was significantly associated with the relative length of the telomeres“, the researchers report in the journal „The Lancet Oncology“. For the ten participants who practiced a healthy lifestyle for over five years, the telomeres were on average ten percent longer than the control group. The participants, who strictly adhered to healthy lifestyles, even showed an even stronger growth of protein structures. In the control group, which did not alter their lifestyle, telomeres had shrunk by an average of three percent during the study period.

The studies were part of a study on prostate cancer. However, the scientists write that the conclusions are not only valid for men with this condition. „Larger randomized trials must now confirm these results“, it says in the trade magazine.

Omega-3 fatty acids slow down cell aging
Last year, a study by Professor Janice Kiecolt-Glaser of Ohio State University and her team found that eating omega-3 fatty acids slows the aging process of cells in the human body. Omega-3 fatty acids are contained in fish, among others. The long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids thus favor the growth of telomeres, which consume and shorten with increasing age in the permanent cell division. When the telomeres are completely depleted, preprogrammed cell death inevitably follows. According to the study, these cell components are retained longer by omega-3 fatty acids. (Ag)

Picture: Mandy