Resveratrol Reverses Aging With No Caloric Restrictions

Resveratrol is acquiring growing recognition for its promise in fighting age-related diseases ranging from dementia to diabetes. Up to now, the most reliable, and heavily researched way to extend life span is through the practice of caloric restriction, which involves reducing calorie intake while simultaneously maintaining good nutritional status. Innumerable studies, restricting calorie intake in laboratory animals has proved to prolong their life span by as much as 6O%. While scientists have not yet ascertained that caloric restriction extends life span in humans, the prelimi­nary evidence is very promising. In humans, consuming a low-calorie diet is associated with several possi­ble markers of greater longevity, such as lower insulin levels and reduced body temperatures, along with less of the chromosomal damage that typically accompanies aging. Furthermore, people who consume a low-calorie diet may be less prone to diseases associated with being over­weight or obese, such as metabolic syndrome, diabetes, cancer, and atherosclerosis.
Interest in res­veratrol has produced several recent discoveries. In a landmark study, Harvard University scientists showed that resveratrol could prolong sur­vival by regulating a gene associ­ated with aging that is present in all life forms. They demonstrated that while middle-aged mice fed a high-calorie diet suffered the ravages of obesity-including metabolic changes resembling diabetes, liver and heart damage, and premature death, mice that were fed resveratrol in addition to the high-calorie diet actually exhibited beneficial changes in their physiology resembling those of mice fed a standard diet. Also mice on the non-supple­mented high-calorie diet developed enlarged, fatty livers, resveratrol
supplementation prevented these changes. heart disease and evidence of atherosclerosis were seen in mice fed the high-calorie diet, but not in those that were also given resveratrol. Resveratrol significantly increased survival, reducing the risk of death from the high-calorie diet by 31%. Together, these findings offer pow­erful evidence that resveratrol protected the animals from the harm­ful effects of a high-calorie diet.

Among the life-prolonging ben­efits of resveratrol supplementation demonstrated in the study were increased insulin sensitivity, lower blood sugar, improved motor function, enhanced energy production and the National Institutes of Health is currently sponsoring a clinical trial looking into resveratrol’s ability to fight colon cancer. Resveratrol’s positive impacts on insulin sensitivity and survival were apparent after only six months of treatment. Resveratrol also improved quality of life, as reflected in their physical abili­ties. On a test of balance and coor­dination, the resveratrol-fed mice on the high-calorie diet steadily improved as they aged. The obese resveratrol-supplemented animals experienced all of these benefits without a significant reduction in body weight. Res­veratrol can alleviate the negative impact of a high-calorie diet on over­all health and life span. The ability of resveratrol to prevent the injurious effects of excess caloric intake and modulate known longevity pathways suggests that resveratrol and molecules with similar proper­ties might be valuable tools in the search for key regulators of energy balance, health, and longevity.