In his masterful book “Lifespan: Why We Age- And Why We Don’t Have To” David Sinclair asks, “What if, in our 60’s, we weren’t fretting about leaving a legacy but beginning one? What if we didn’t have to worry that the clock was ticking? In fact, he makes the case that we are closer than you think to changing what “old age” looks like, feels like, performs like. David Sinclair is an optimist of course, but he’s also a Harvard professor and one of the most prolific researchers in the area of aging, or senescence. His lab has turned out paper after paper, building and transforming our understanding of the aging processes. Some of the things he has uncovered have rapidly entered the mainstream, at least the mainstream consciousness of groups willing to act on early information, before it is proven and tested in prospective trials. We have learned that a little bit of stress is good for the body, for example, periods of cold, periods of fasting, eating less volumes of food (even 12% less) than most, exercising daily. He does not preach extremes- a brisk cold walk after dinner will do.
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What Is VO2 Max? Why Is VO2 Max Important For Longevity?
How VO2 Max Supports Fitness For Longevity
Visit a primary care practitioner for an annual physical exam and you will have an assessment of basic health information like height, weight, and vital signs, including heart rate, blood pressure, and cholesterol, along with perhaps a resting electrocardiogram and basic labs. However, it is well known that this data is insufficient to identify patients at risk for early disease or death nor will it predict functional decline with aging. Read more
Flexible Dieting: Building Lifelong Habits To Promote Optimal Wellness
The Epidemic Of Chronic Weight Gain And Rising Obesity
There are many reasons why we in the US and other western nations, and now also underdeveloped countries, have experienced a rising tide of obesity. We do eat more calories than in the 1950s –in some surveys, the American adult eats 500-700 calories more per day than 70 years ago. And yes, we are more sedentary. Our jobs are increasingly desk and computer-centered, with factory, farming, and manual jobs on the decrease or partially automated. Read more
Plentiful Protein: How Much Protein Do We Really Need?
The Recommended Daily Allowance Is Less Than Optimal
The Glymphatic System: New Discoveries On Sleep And The Aging Of The Brain
Our Brain’s Newly Discovered Lymphatic System
Somehow, despite thousands of neurosurgeries and thousands of brain images, we missed it: there is a system of drainage vessels buried under the dura mater, the leather-like outer layer that surrounds the brain. It was theorized to exist in 2015 and definitively found in 2017. The glymphatic system is the lymphatic system of the brain, responsible for removing pathological proteins, including amyloid, that build up during the course of the day. The glymphatic system functions primarily during sleep, and mainly during the deeper phases of sleep, medically termed “N3” sleep. As we age, our other two systems of brain “cleaning” slow down, our sleep quality deteriorates, and metabolic debris, along with amyloid, begins to stack up… another challenge of aging. Read more
URIC ACID: Much Bigger Than A Big Toe Problem!
A Malady Of Kings
Uric acid is probably most famous for causing gout, an extremely painful, acute arthritis typically in the big toe but occasionally in other joints. However, new research over the last 10 years has exposed this circulating purine breakdown product as a metabolite that warrants our attention and concern, and not just for the health of our toes! There is accumulating evidence that uric acid directly causes fat accumulation, predicts the development of diabetes, and plays a major role in the appearance of metabolic syndrome (hypertension, diabetes, high lipids, abdominal fat deposits). All this can happen with or without a red-hot toe. Read more
Ode to Dark Chocolate: The Health Benefits of Dark Chocolate for Aging Skin
Dark Chocolate’s Health Benefits Include Skin Health
No website or blog on longevity medicine would be complete without a piece on aging skin, which includes UV-induced photodamage, loss of dermal matrix, and wrinkles. Of course, hormones, lifestyle, and sun exposure play a large role in how our skin ages, and we are covering those topics in other pieces. But I recently came across a series of articles highlighting the large beneficial effect of one of my favorite foods: dark chocolate! Read more
What Is Zone 2 Training And Why Is It Important?
What if I offered you a pill that took your cellular age back ten to fifteen years? This pill also increases mitochondrial numbers (kind of like the number of battery chargers in our cells), increases overall available energy, improves metabolic flexibility, lowers resting heart rate, decreases blood pressure, and improves insulin resistance? This “pill” is yours for the taking, except we call it “zone 2 training”.
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Your Immune System Reboot: Diet & Lifestyle
When the coronavirus SARS-co-v2, a devastating communicable disease, descended upon the global population in December 2019, it became clear early on that there was a wide spectrum of illness, ranging from almost nothing to diarrhea, severe pneumonia, stroke, and death. By May of 2020, it became even more clear that there are particular conditions (“comorbidities”) that markedly increase the disease severity and death rate, and that these conditions had in common an immune system dysfunction with the shared characteristic of chronic inflammation. We have learned that people with chronic inflammation have higher levels of furin and that furin acts as a facilitator to allow better binding of the viral spike protein to our ACE2 receptors. Harboring chronic inflammation turns us into something like Velcro, attracting more virus, secreting more furin, and allowing more severe disease states to evolve. Read more
Polypill vs. Treadmill: Walking Your Way to Optimal Health
My grandfather used to say “Exercise? I get plenty of exercise – pushing myself back from the dinner table every night!” Of course, he walked almost daily on the Coney Island boardwalk in the middle of the winter and lived well into his 90s, so this was really just a way to get a laugh from us. Read more
Why We Age and Why Genomics?
In his masterful book “Lifespan: Why We Age- And Why We Don’t Have To” David Sinclair asks, “What if, in our 60’s, we weren’t fretting about leaving a legacy but beginning one? What if we didn’t have to worry that the clock was ticking? In fact, he makes the case that we are closer than you think to changing what “old age” looks like, feels like, performs like. David Sinclair is an optimist of course, but he’s also a Harvard professor and one of the most prolific researchers in the area of aging, or senescence. His lab has turned out paper after paper, building and transforming our understanding of the aging processes. Some of the things he has uncovered have rapidly entered the mainstream, at least the mainstream consciousness of groups willing to act on early information, before it is proven and tested in prospective trials. We have learned that a little bit of stress is good for the body, for example, periods of cold, periods of fasting, eating less volumes of food (even 12% less) than most, exercising daily. He does not preach extremes- a brisk cold walk after dinner will do.
Read more