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Calorie Reduction, Genes, and Longevity
Calorie restriction has long been viewed as a way to extend life for organisms ranging from yeast to mammals -- including, possibly, humans. It was thought that by lowering metabolism, you could cut down on the amount of oxygen free radicals circulating in the body. The oxygen free radicals, a natural byproduct of metabolism, can damage cells.
Now new research in yeast suggests that the conventional wisdom is all wrong. A study reported in the journal Nature suggests that cutting calories may lengthen life span by boosting an organism’s oxygen consumption.
For some time, scientists have known that a gene called Sir2 seems to play a vital role in longevity. In yeast, deleting the Sir2 gene shortens life span, while adding an extra Sir2 extends it. Researchers in this study were able to show that the activity of Sir2 is tied to metabolism.
In this latest study, they looked at how calorie restriction might boost Sir2 activity and thereby extend the life span of yeast. The investigators found that, in contrast to the slowed-metabolism theory, sugar-deprived yeast cells boosted their oxygen consumption -- which would, in theory, increase oxygen free radicals in a human.
They further found that overexpressing a gene believed to rev up oxygen consumption extended the life span of yeast cells -- an effect that, like calorie restriction, required the Sir2 gene.
All of this suggests that calorie restriction does not make yeast longer-lived by fighting oxidative damage. Calorie restriction doesn’t merely slow metabolism, it changes it. According to the researcher, the relationship among calorie restriction, the Sir2 gene and life span appears ‘much deeper’ than the theory on slowed metabolism and reduced oxygen free radical damage would indicate.
Exactly how cutting calories might act upon the Sir2 gene, and thereby life span, remains unknown.
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Submitted by C.Worth - Abstracted from the article 'You Are My Sunshine' from the Functional Foods network, January 2003.
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