Seaweed Fiber in Liquid Meals May Cut Hunger

Adding a dietary fiber derived from seaweed to a meal-replacement drink may reduce feelings of hunger by 30%, a team of industry researchers reports.

Researchers from Unilever’s Research and Development in the Netherlands compared the effects on hunger after drinking a meal-replacement drink with the fiber, alginate, at two different strengths and without it.

The higher concentration alginate drink reduced hunger longest — up to nearly five hours after drinking it.

via Seaweed Fiber in Liquid Meals May Cut Hunger.

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Scientists ferret out a key pathway for aging

For decades, scientists have been searching for the fundamental biological secrets of how eating less extends lifespan.

It has been well documented in species ranging from spiders to monkeys that a diet with consistently fewer calories can dramatically slow the process of aging and improve health in old age. But how a reduced diet acts at the most basic level to influence metabolism and physiology to blunt the age-related decline of tissues and cells has remained, for the most part, a mystery.

Now, writing in the current online issue (Nov. 18) of the journal Cell, a team of scientists from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and their colleagues describe a molecular pathway that is a key determinant of the aging process. The finding not only helps explain the cascade of events that contributes to aging, but also provides a rational basis for devising interventions, drugs that may retard aging and contribute to better health in old age.

Aging gracefully requires taking out the trash

Suppressing a cellular cleanup-mechanism known as autophagy can accelerate the accumulation of protein aggregates that leads to neural degeneration. In an upcoming issue of Autophagy, scientists at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies report for the first time that the opposite is true as well: Boosting autophagy in the nervous system of fruit flies prevented the age-dependent accumulation of cellular damage in neurons and promoted longevity.

 

10-fold life span extension reported in simple organism

Biologists have created baker’s yeast capable of living to 800 in yeast years without apparent side effects. The basic but important discovery, achieved through a combination of dietary and genetic changes, brings science closer to controlling the survival and health of the unit of all living systems: the cell.

Appetite Regulation Molecule Found: Could Lead To Treatments For Obesity And Unwanted Weight Loss

A team of researchers from the St Vincent’s Campus in Sydney have developed a novel way to control the extreme weight loss, common in late stage cancer, which often speeds death.

Scientists link gene that promotes long lifespan to cholesterol

MIT researchers have discovered a link between a gene believed to promote long lifespan and a pathway that flushes cholesterol from the body.

The finding could help researchers create drugs that lower the risk of diseases associated with high cholesterol, including atherosclerosis (clogged arteries) and Alzheimer’s disease.

Scientists reveal how caloric restriction extends life by reducing toxic trash

Reduce, recycle and rebuild is as important to the most basic component of the human body, the cell, as it is to the environment. And a University of Florida study shows just how much the body benefits when it “goes green,” at least if you’re a rat: Cutting calories helps rodents live longer by boosting cells’ ability to recycle damaged parts so they can maintain efficient energy production.

“Caloric restriction is a way to extend life in animals. If you give them less food, the stress of this healthy habit actually makes them live longer,” said Christiaan Leeuwenburgh, chief of the division of biology of aging in UF’s Institute on Aging. Understanding how the process works at the cellular level in rodents could help scientists develop drugs that mimic the process in humans, Leeuwenburgh added.

Reducing insulin signaling in the brain can prolong lifespan

One route to a long and healthy life may be establishing the right balance in insulin signaling between the brain and the rest of the body, according to new research from Children’s Hospital Boston. The study, published in the July 20 issue of Science, not only reinforces the value of exercising and eating in moderation, but also helps explain a paradox in longevity research.

It’s never late to reduce calorie intake and slow aging

Much research has shown that reduced calorie intake can increase health and longevity. Professor Stephen Spindler (University of California) and his collaborators have discovered that reducing calorie intake later in life can still induce many of the health and longevity benefits of life-long calorie reduction. Importantly, this also includes anti-cancer effects. They are using this knowledge to establish a novel screening technique to find drugs which mimic this longevity effect.

How Eating Less Might Make You Live Longer

Caloric Restriction in non-obese people translates into less oxidative damage in muscle cells, according to a new study by scientists at Pennington Biomedical Research Center. As oxidative damage has been linked to aging, this could explain how limiting calorie intake without malnutrition extends life span.

Civitarese and colleagues found that indeed fewer calories can improve whole body metabolism in conjunction with an increase in SIRT1 gene expression in skeletal muscle. These results raise the possibility that SIRT1 may contribute to more efficient metabolism, less oxidative stress, and increase longevity in humans as it does in lower organism. (Credit: Image courtesy of Public Library of Science)

Whiff of Food Cancels Longevity from Caloric Restriction

Evidence began mounting as long as 70 years ago that restricting calories while consuming necessary amounts of sustenance could increase one’s life span. Since then, a group called the North Carolina-based Calorie Restriction Society has sprouted whose 1,800 members routinely down about half of the daily caloric intake recommended by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in the hope of living to the ripe old age of 120.

New research may prompt the organization to send out nose plugs with its next newsletter.A team of scientists at the Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, found that the average life span of fruit flies on restricted diets decreased when they were exposed to food odors.

Read rest of this story on Scientific American site.

Resveratrol prevents obesity and drastically increases physical endurance.

Researchers at the Institute of Genetics and Molecular and Cellular Biology in Illkirch, France have found that resveratrol boosts the exercise capacity of muscles in mice and protects against diet-induced insulin resistance and obesity. The research was published online on November 16, 2006 in the journal Cell.

Reduced body temperature extends lifespan

“Our study shows it is possible to increase lifespan in mice by modest but prolonged lowering of core body temperature,” said Bruno Conti, an associate professor at Scripps Research who led the study. “This longer lifespan was attained independent of calorie restriction.”

Calorie restriction in non-human primates may prevent and reduce Alzheimer’s disease neuropathology

A new study directed by Mount Sinai School of Medicine extends and strengthens the research that experimental dietary regimens might halt or even reverse symptoms of Alzheimer’s Disease (AD).

Researchers Find New Clues To Biochemistry Of ‘Anti-Aging

University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers have found that sirtuins, a family of enzymes linked to a longer life span and healthier aging in humans, may orchestrate the activity of other enzymes involved in metabolic processes in the body.
Published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the study is the first to show that sirtuins directly control specific metabolic enzymes – called AceCSs – in mammalian cells.

The finding, which shines a spotlight on enzymes only recently thought to play a role in the biochemistry of “anti-aging,” has attracted the interest of biotechnology companies seeking to make drugs that delay the aging process and age-related diseases. The drugs could target the metabolic enzymes to produce health benefits.

Calorie restriction may prevent Alzheimer’s through promotion of longevity program in the brain

For the first time researchers show how restricting caloric intake triggers activity in the brain associated with longevity.

A recent study directed by Mount Sinai School of Medicine suggests that experimental dietary regimens might calm or even reverse symptoms of Alzheimer’s Disease (AD). The study, which appears in the July 2006 issue of the Journal of Biological Chemistry, is the first to show that restricting caloric intake, specifically carbohydrates, may prevent AD by triggering activity in the brain associated with longevity.

Calorie Restriction Appears Better Than Exercise At Slowing Primary Aging

The researchers also found that calorie restriction (CR) decreases the circulating concentration of a powerful inflammatory molecule called tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF). They say the combination of lower T3 levels and reduced inflammation may slow the aging process by reducing the body's metabolic rate as well as oxidative damage to cells and tissues.

Caloric restriction appears to prevent aging in the heart

Eating a very low-calorie yet nutritionally balanced diet is good for your heart. Studying heart function in members of an organization called the Caloric Restriction Society, investigators at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis found that their hearts functioned like the hearts of much younger people.