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Scientists Show Human Aging Rates Vary Widely
HughPickens.com writes: Ever notice at your high school reunions how some classmates look ten years older than everybody else — and some look ten years younger. Now BBC reports that a study of people born within a year of each other has uncovered a huge gulf in the speed at which human bodies bodies age. The report tracked traits such as weight, kidney function and gum health and found that some of the 38-year-olds in the study were aging so badly that their "biological age" was on the cusp of retirement. "They look rough, they look lacking in vitality," says Prof Terrie Moffitt. The study says some people had almost stopped aging during the period of the study, while others were gaining nearly three years of biological age for every twelve months that passed. "Any area of life where we currently use chronological age is faulty, if we knew more about biological age we could be more fair and egalitarian," says Moffitt. The researchers studied aging in 954 young humans, the Dunedin Study birth cohort, tracking multiple biomarkers across three time points spanning their third and fourth decades of life. They developed and validated two methods by which aging can be measured in young adults, one cross-sectional and one longitudinal. According to Moffit the science of healthspan extension may be focused on the wrong end of the lifespan; rather than only studying old humans, geroscience should also study the young. "Eventually if we really want to slow the process of ageing to prevent the onset of disease we're going to have to intervene with young people."
I have some old friends that are meth addicts that look like my grandparents.
What you do/experience when you are young (smoking, drinking to much, too little sleep, bad excercise, bad housing ... etc. ) comes back to haunt you.
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i'm 41. and people who meet me for the first time think i'm in my mid 20's. same with my wife. don't drink more than once or twice a month, exercise, avoid eating out all the time and avoid processed foods. stay away from milk, sugar and gluten. cook for yourself and don't buy the prepared foods
No, I haven't read the article. Are there really differences in the speed with which we age, or is it more about how we live our lives, what we eat, how much time we spend in direct sunlight, exposure to disease, drugs, alcohol, pollutant, etc.?
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Every time a cell needs to be replaced the DNA has to get copied. From the fertilized egg to the adult should only require 60 dna replications (2^60~10^18 cells) to live for at least 270 years. Humans consist of ~10^13 cells at any one moment so every cell being replaced once a day 10^5/(365)=273 yrs.
I'm glad that most researchers don't think that way, as the downside of researching everything only once is that when the research of topic X gets busted for using wrong data, there is no research support left. I'm not saying that you should never stop researching one topic, but human aging is so complicated that I don't see the point in stopping research on this topic.
From the summary: "Any area of life where we currently use chronological age is faulty, if we knew more about biological age we could be more fair and egalitarian,"
That depends. Should people with a higher biological age retire earlier? Kinda unfair to people who looked after themselves.
Of course I can also see ways to make good use of this: It would be interesting to see if certain jobs are linked to people ageing faster. Maybe (maybe) people in those jobs should be give the option of retiring earlier, with pensions adjusted somehow.
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Consuming 40 pounds of blueberries a day will stop the aging process!
I can see lifestyle and genetics being the main drivers. Look at 3rd world citizens, some look like they are 50 when they are in their late 20's. High stress life, lack of proper nutrition, etc...
But then you have the genetics curveball. There is a guy here at work that is 70 years old and he looks like he is not a day over 40.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Well even if you are allowed to retire earlier, you would make less money than a person who was healthy enough to work another decade. So I feel that there is a built in incentive there.
Unless one adjusts for that too, giving preferential treatment to those who age faster, giving them greater fianancial benefits in retirement.
Mind you, I don't agree with that, mainly since in my experiences with my extended family (my paternal grandparents had a LOT of children) there's huge variation in how people have aged, so it's clearly not simply a matter of biology. Choice plays a rather large part and those that have engaged in fewer self-destructive habits have generally aged better.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
I'm 37 but I look like I'm in my late 20s, but I was always a late bloomer. The cost was that in high school I still looked like a kid, while the early bloomers were already passing on their genes...
There have been plenty of studies in fruit flies and such that show you can alter lifespan and time of sexual maturity. That's most likely what we're seeing here as well. There will certainly be environmental influences, but they will be far less significant than genetics.
Getting back in touch with high-school classmates was a huge eye-opener for me. I'm 47 now, graduated in 1986. Many of my classmates look like they're in their 60s. I'm not exaggerating. It's just amazing to me how differently people age.
Do you have ESP?
Any area of life where we currently use chronological age is faulty
Not quite.
How about areas of life like experience or shared age-based cultural milestones, both of which depend highly on your year of birth?
"How many years have you spoken [insert your native tongue here]?"
"How many years have you known how to multiply small numbers in your head?"
"Who was your President/head of state when you turned 18/reached the age of majority/reached voting age?"
"How many years since you started high school?" (in countries where almost everyone at least starts high school)
"When were you confirmed/bar-mitzvahed/considered an adult congregant in your church/synagog/place of worship?" (where the question is asked of someone who grew up in such a religious body)
These and many related "areas of life" are so highly correlated with chronological age that the statement "Any area of life where we currently use chronological age is faulty" is only true if "faulty" means "only slightly faulty, but still a good general assumption."
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generally eating gluten free is better for your digestive system
There is no credible scientific study I am aware of that supports this statement. If you wish to assert this you need to provide non-anecdotal evidence, preferably in the form of a double blind study supporting this assertion. I am not aware of any evidence that gluten is measurably harmful to individuals without celiac disease, an allergy or other form of gluten sensitivity. This is a very small portion of the population (somewhere between 0.5% and 1%) that is known to be affected. The best available evidence appears to clearly show that if your aren't part of that population then avoiding gluten is a waste of effort.
if you want to stay young, avoid as many processed foods as you can.
Again you are asserting that "staying young" is linked to avoiding processed foods. While there is evidence to support that processed foods are frequently harmful if consumed regularly over time, you cannot automatically generalize this to link it to biological aging (versus chronological aging) without evidence. There may very well be a link but it is unproven at this time. I understand that it sounds reasonable but lots of things sound reasonable that aren't actually true.
We must fair and egalitarian. There can be no losers, it's just not the modern PC way.
:)
I propose that if we cannot retard the aging of those who age more quickly, then we must work to accelerate the aging of those who appear younger, to level the playing field.
We'll call it, "Redistribution of Health". (insert the obligatory "thanks Obama" here )
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I recently had a high school re-union, and some people did look a lot older. I guess you could make a complex theory about how some people genetically age faster than others, even if their overall lifespan is approximately the same. However, the real determination was: "are they fat?" People who weighed more also tend to look older.
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Gaussian distribution?
"How many years have you spoken [insert your native tongue here]?"
Not useful information. Some people are better-spoken at 15 than are others at 51.
"How many years have you known how to multiply small numbers in your head?"
Some people never learn this. You tell them how much change they're going to give you and they say "You've got math in your head". Not making this up, even a little bit.
"Who was your President/head of state when you turned 18/reached the age of majority/reached voting age?"
What does that have to do with anything?
"When were you confirmed/bar-mitzvahed/considered an adult congregant in your church/synagog/place of worship?"
Can't ask that in a job interview :p
I know this wasn't all about job interviews, but since most of your questions smelled like interview questions...
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The GOP prefers people who earn an honest living. Your teachers didn't do the job they were paid for.
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The bias of the researcher (Moffitt) is obvious and annoying. Oh goodness! It's unfair that people who age rapidly have the same retirement age as everyone else.
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Health nuts are going to feel stupid someday, lying in hospitals dying of nothing.
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This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
Molecular biology is extremely complex, and we have barely scratched the surface on all the mechanisms when things are going right. When things go wrong, the complexity is much greater. To improve health and extend life, these mechanisms must be understood and acted on.
..
Since, as a general rule, big government can't make the average person better off and indeed damages them, expect the same thing with regard to lifespan. Indeed, this is the theme of "Logan's Run".
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"...with pensions adjusted somehow."
What are these "pensions" you speak of?
I don't respond to AC's.
I don't even know what "fairness" is supposed to mean in this case. Is it supposed to mean that people who are genetically better off pay extra for people with poor genes to compensate and help them? Or is it supposed to mean that people who are genetically better off pay less for healthcare because they need it less but are forced to retire later? Or what?
This attitude that government should somehow compensate for genetic differences to make society "fair and egalitarian" is offensive and dystopian. People would do well to read Harrison Bergeron again.
The only fair society is one that lets people make their own decisions about how to lead their own lives, and how to spread out savings and consumption over their lifetime.
For me the greatest change was adopting low carb diet and exercising. However, I think I did this a bit too late [at 40]. So now I can do a lot more than a year a ago and I mean a lot more [figure and fitness level are as a young man]...but the skin is not very elastic anymore so in the face I kind of aged [smoking for 20 years does not help].
Stress - the biggest killer. A few years worrying all the time about health [the system fucked me] , my relationship [dying, now totally dead] and financial troubles [stemming from health] really, really aged me.
Genetics has a lot to do with it too [messa thinks]...my grandmother had baby skin at 72 when she died [she looked like Merlin Monroe as young woman] . She never smoked but drunk quite a bit. My mother at 67 looks at least a decade younger and without her life-time smoking it would have been much better. Next to her sister you see that the smoking aged her skin quite a bit but mom had better diet so aunty is smooth in the face but not so energetic, agile and resilient compared to mom.
Another thing I have noticed with my grandparents is the importance of the will to live. From my father side both were classical farmers. Whole life waking up at 5AM...work and work and work....but once they decided to sell the house and the farm and move closer to the capital where both sons were living they collapsed. Although the idea was exactly the opposite - that they'd be closer to family, easier to receive help, enjoy their retirement with grand kids... somehow it went exactly the other way. Once they were torn away from the life they knew since forever they both aged quickly, got all kinds of illnesses and eventually passed away...
Go figure....
Both lack of sleep and stress can cause people to look older, if what research (as reported by popular media) is right. Parents tend to suffer from irregular sleep and more stress.
I may well end up not being able to work until normal retirement age due to various health issues, none of them caused by lifestyle (genetic auto-immune problems). So I've given this some though, but obviously I'm biased.
I want to work and earn for as long as I can, of course. Maybe there will even be a cure one day, although currently medical science doesn't even understand the problem. Of course, I might end up with a small pension and early retirement, and then be reliant on benefits. I hope I won't, but can't rule it out.
There are too many variables. If there is a cure one day, it might be really expensive. More expensive than I can afford perhaps, but it might be in society's interests to give it to me anyway. I find some people blame me for my condition, even though it isn't my fault, but I do kind of understand them. To them I look normal, no obvious signs of illness. They can't understand why I don't, for example, exercise more. They don't know what its like to live with this stuff, or understand why I have to be "lazy" in order to keep functioning. If I seem reluctant, they think it's just me not making an effort to look after myself, but that isn't the case. So I worry that in future there may be even less sympathy than there is now.
The human body is pretty unreliable, it seems. I don't know anyone who reached 35 without at least one major problem. It's expensive to fix too. We need to stop blaming people and figure out how to make things better for everyone, without feeling jealous that some are getting more help than others.
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I reached 35 without any major problems caused by the body itself. I've had my share of minor ones like viral or bacterial illness and the occasional injury, and even moderate ones like seasonal allergies, wisdom teeth, and a need for vision correction, but so far nothing that couldn't be addressed at a doctor's office or an urgent-care clinic if they'd been open. Went to the ER a couple of times because of outright injury without an urgent care facility being open.
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Should people with a higher biological age retire earlier? Kinda unfair to people who looked after themselves.
What about those who take care of themselves, but were in the unlucky part of the gene pool that included high cholesterol, heart disease, diabetes, Alzheimers, cancer?
With all of those items in my own family history, and being in my late 50s, I've been doing what I can, but I personally plan on retiring (not completely, but doing something I really enjoy like volunteering) as early as financially possible. I've seen too many people who never got to enjoy any of those later years before they were dead, brain dead, or riddled with cancer.
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Don't you think she looks tired?
~Loyal
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Yankees first baseman just gave up milk as well and says he's never felt better.
Good for him. That has nothing to do with me or millions of other people. I drink milk daily and I feel great. Times when I've gone without it had no effect on me positive or negative. So what exactly am I to learn from your anecdote?
even if you're not allergic to milk like I am, it's not very good for you after a while
And your evidence for this is what exactly? Unless you have a specific digestion problem with dairy (and many people do) every bit of evidence suggests it is a fine part of a balanced diet. It's on the food pyramid and every dietician I've ever met will tell you dairy is just fine. We're mammals so milk is one of the things that sort of defines us. It's basically the perfect food for a mammal nutrition-wise so long as you can digest it safely.
Kinda unfair to people who looked after themselves.
Do we have evidence that "looking after yourself" is the only factor, or even the biggest factor, in "aging rate" that they're talking about? As you point out, if it's related to taking certain jobs, it seems like it might be more fair to make sure that people who take those jobs get to retire earlier. But what if it's genetic, or some other set of factors that people can't really control?
Doctors used to prescribe bloodletting for centuries, until the it was declared "unscientific". And back again...
But it has never been mandatory... Even today Red Cross and others beg and encourage would-be donors to give blood — wouldn't it be nice for the government to compel citizens to do it? A "common-sense measure to help restore the health of our great nation", uhm?
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
My sensei always said "You don't grow old from the years; you grow old from inactivity".
I think that is very true. I try to stay active and people are always surprised to find out that i'm actually 10 years older than they thought.
Political correctness is really just herd psychology pushed by insecure people who desperately seek social conformity.
When people say 'gosh you look like 20,' they're actually basing that on the way you behave, not your appearance.
(Insert smiley faces at your own discretion)
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The recursion inherent in you calling said people "white trash" does bring to mind some interesting possibilities.
Though I believe researching slowing or even stopping aging is valuable, I always wonder how social development would continue. How would society look in 500 years if people of today could live that long? How would society look today if people from 500 years ago lived today?
In our latest studies on various diseases associated with aging, many are now following younger subjects. The major problem is that annual followups tend not to work as well, since younger people are busy, so you have to go from an annual cycle to an every 2-3 year cycle. However, this makes changes more noticeable. Following subjects when they're very young is more difficult, as they tend to move a lot more. So most studies now are shifting to a 35-40 lower age range.
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Must be some lingering Elvish blood in some of these people...
It doesn't matter where the processing occurred - in your home, in a factory, or wherever, so long as the food doesn't contain excessive quantities of crap.
Processed foods purchased from a store tend to have high amounts of sugar, salt, fat, preservatives, additives and other ingredients to make them more appealing and/or have longer shelf life.
In other words, store-bought processed foods are high in crap. I think you too are in violent agreement.
Err you may want to read your own citations properly. Not just some assertions on a web page, but the references ...Which are also mostly assertions on other web pages. And well that is not really a study. Then you want to read, the rather thin list of real studies through that link forest and look at the REAL DATA. Not just shit some guy at the gym said.
TL;DR
It does not say what you think it says.
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