OT: Anti-Aging Remedies

[Guest guest]

Also from October 2004. Butch

 

The Real Deal on Anti-Aging Remedies

By Priscilla Grant

 

Which remedies are most likely to help you turn back the clock in the

next five, 10, or 20 years?

 

Our Anti-Aging Priorities

 

Put " age-defying " on any product, and most of us are ripe for the hype.

We've gotten lots of help cosmetically, with lip-plumpers,

teeth-whiteners, and wrinkle-fillers. Yet, what about a longer,

healthier life? According to MORE's online poll, that's what we really want.

 

While casual Net surfers can find any number of self-proclaimed

anti-aging pills and potions, no currently marketed substance -- not one

-- has yet been proved to slow or reverse human aging. But in the midst

of all this snake oil salesmanship, scientists have been making real

progress. Many top academics have formed for-profit companies whose very

names -- Elixir Pharmaceuticals, LifeGen Technologies, Longenity --

advertise the fountain-of-youth bent of their research. News of various

therapies, including the enticing " anti-aging pill, " surfaced last year

in the business pages of The New York Times, Fortune, and the Wall

Street Journal. Indeed, if a truly effective anti-aging drug were found,

the payoff would make Viagra sales look anemic.

 

So, how close is science to delivering your top three anti-aging

priorities, which, according to our poll, are freedom from disease,

energetic physical function, and a lively brain? Well, if the most

promising research pans out, we could get all three.

 

What Is Aging Anyway?

 

Once, even doctors thought that a bent-over spine, painful joints,

sadness, and mental confusion were simply part of getting old. Now we

recognize these as symptoms of disease (osteoporosis, arthritis,

depression, and dementia), and we seek to prevent and treat them.

 

Biologically, aging is still not completely understood. Most scientists

define it as the accumulation of random damage to the building blocks of

life -- especially to DNA, and to certain proteins, carbohydrates, and

fats. Some of this random damage comes from free radicals -- those

necessary, but highly reactive, molecules released during metabolism,

which sustain life by converting what we eat into energy. The body's

self-repair mechanisms fix most of the damage, but not all. As we grow

older, the repair mechanisms don't work as well, allowing free-radical

damage to accumulate; cells, tissues, and organs become impaired, and we

become more vulnerable to disease. That results in characteristic signs

of aging: loss of muscle and bone mass, decline in reaction time,

reduced hearing and vision, thinner and less elastic skin.

 

People with the right mix of genes, such as centenarians who come from

family clusters of long-lived people, seem better able to withstand

routine wear and tear in the cells. For instance, smoking damages DNA,

putting smokers at much higher risk for many diseases -- but tell that

to Helen Faith Reichert, a 102-year-old who has smoked all her adult

life. If anti-aging scientists succeed in " bottling " some part of

Reichert's genetic defense, more of us might join the centenarian club.

 

Continued: Will We Make It to 100?

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Continued: Remedies: Calories & Inflammation

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Continued: Genetic Manipulation & Antioxidants

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Continued: hGH, Stem Cells, Telomeres

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