Longevity Daily: 3rd September, 2020

Everyday our team of researchers in Oxford are inundated with scientific, and medical research articles that have the potential to improve health, wellbeing, and longevity. In this blog we highlight a few of them that caught our attention today.

1. We have no idea about what is in our food.
   • Why is this important: You have heard of the old adage that you are what you eat. But do you know what is in your food? Our understanding of how our diet affects our health come from only 150 nutritional components that are tracked by the National Nutrient Database for Standard Reference, maintained by the US Department of Agriculture (USDA). But even a simple food like garlic contains thousands of distinct chemical components that affect our metabolism. Understanding this chemical complexity of our food will help us personalize our nutrition.
   • What did the researchers do: Researchers from Northwestern University, and Harvard University leverage the latest machine learning and big data analytics to fully map out the components our food, and how these components interact with our health.
   • Key takeaway(s): Researchers have created a massive database called FoodDB which holds information on about 70,000 nutritional compounds, which is nearly 400 times more than the current USDA database. For example, the USDA database list that garlic and iceberg lettuce contain 67, and 11, macro and micro-nutrients, respectively. Whilst FoodDB lists that garlic contains over 2306 compound, of which only 146 have been quantified, and we don’t know the amount of the other 2000 compounds. Similarly, FoodDB lists that iceberg lettuce contains over 4000 compounds, and 90% of these are unknown.
     • Researchers state that we have severely underestimated the complexity of our nutrition, and how it interacts with our health.
       
       
2. Can alpha-ketoglutarate extend lifespan and healthspan?
   • Why is this important: Metabolism and aging are closely connected. Alpha-ketoglutarate is a ketone that plays an important role in energy metabolism, stabilises the immune system and modulates protein production. Research also suggests that alpha ketoglutarate can modulate the aging process.
   • What did the researchers do: In this study, researchers investigated the effect of alpha-ketoglutarate (delivered in the form of a calcium salt, CaAKG) on the health and longevity of aging mice.
   • Key takeaway(s): Middle-aged female mice lived longer with alpha-ketoglutarate supplementation, while both males and females lived healthier lives with less frailty in old age. The reduction in frailty was more dramatic than the lifespan extension. Supplementation was also associated with a reduction in inflammatory molecules and an increase in the anti-inflammatory molecule IL-10.
     
     
3. Human lifespan has low heritability, however, that might not be a case with survival into extreme ages.
   • Why is this important: Studies have shown that parents, siblings and children of longevous person have lived longer than relatives of the non-longevous person. This suggests that there are specific longevity genes that cluster within families. A better understanding of those genetic factors will help provide insights into mechanisms that promote longer healthspan and survivability.
   • What did the researchers do: In this article, researchers have studied 20,360 families, comprising 314,819 individuals. Their results provide strong evidence that longevity is transmitted as a quantitative genetic trait among survivors up to the top 10% of their birth cohort

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