Good news! A recent study suggested that resveratrol, a red wine compound, may extend our life. The study was conducted on fries and worms to see if resveratrol can extend life in these creatures. Previous studies suggested that yeast life can be extended with resveratrol. It was found that worms and fires fed resveratrol live 30% longer than those that were not fed resveratrol. Fries and humans share many biological processes. Therefore, there is a chance this red wine compound may also extend life in humans. Previous studies have found that resveratrol is protective against heart diseases largely due to the antioxidative properties of this compound. However, the current finding, life-extension with resveratrol, may not be due to its antioxidative properties. Rather, resveratrol may act just like calorie-restriction that activates proteins called sirtuins similar to sir2. Sir2 is an important protein that is present in many animals and participate in the aging regulations. More good news with resveratrol! Resveratrol does not have any negative impact on the fertility while calorie-restriction may cause infertility. Actually, resveratrol boosts the fertility of fries. The researchers plan to continue their work on mice. If they can duplicate the same results in mice, resveratrol can be a wonder chemical that can help us extend our life to certain degree. This study was done by David Sinclair of Harvard Medical School in Boston and colleagues at the University of Connecticut and Brown University in Rhode Island. The study was published in the July 13 issue of journal Nature. |
