Dear Health Conscious Reader,
You’ve probably noticed that telomeres are getting a lot of media attention. The BBC, CBS News in New York and L.A., and newspapers like USA Today and The New York Times have all done reports.
Do you know what telomeres are? They cap the ends of your chromosomes and keep your DNA strands from fraying.
But each time your cells divide, your telomeres get shorter, and your cells act older.
Short telomeres dramatically boost your risk of serious diseases. One study of 60- to 75-year-olds showed those with short telomeres had a 300 percent higher death rate from heart disease. They also had an 800 percent higher death rate from infectious diseases.1
Scientists have learned that you can delay the shortening of the telomere by activating an enzyme that rebuilds them. The discovery of this substance, called telomerase, was such a breakthrough that it won the 2009 Nobel Prize in Medicine.
Researchers have since built on this discovery and developed a therapy called the “Patton Protocol” that can activate telomerase. It uses a nutritional supplement synthesized from a rare molecule of the astragalus plant.
The supplement is very expensive. But a recent study shows people taking it had a lower percentage of short telomeres, and immune systems that acted up to 20 years younger.2
If you can afford it, this supplement is a great way to go. But there also are other ways to slow the shortening of your telomeres, activate your longevity genes, power up your body and feel like you did 10 or even 20 years ago.
One of the best ways to stay young is with resveratrol.
You’ve probably heard that resveratrol is a kind of antioxidant. But did you know that resveratrol can protect you from the damages of aging while helping to “switch on” your anti-aging genes?
That’s because resveratrol is a type of phytoalexin containing a key enzyme called stilbene synthase. Not all plants carry this enzyme, and that’s why not all plants can make resveratrol. Plants produce phytoalexins for self-defense. Whether it’s bad weather, or an attack by insects or microbes, plants use phytoalexins to protect themselves when they’re under stress from their environment.
And resveratrol works the same way in humans. It activates certain proteins called “sirtuins,” which your body produces naturally to extend life under conditions of stress (like starvation).
Sirtuins transmit signals to every cell in your body that cancel out the effects of aging. They bring the processes that lead to cell death to a crawl, buying your body more time to repair DNA damage.
In fact, resveratrol can induce cell repair all by itself. One study found that resveratrol actually causes cells to make new mitochondria (the power plants that give your cells their energy).
Resveratrol also can protect you from the effects of aging. Researchers took two groups of rats and pre-treated one group with resveratrol. They then tried to induce the kind of inflammation and cardiovascular damage you would see with aging in both groups. But the rats treated with resveratrol were protected and showed no damage.3
Another way resveratrol can help keep you young is by improving your body’s response to exercise. Researchers gave mice resveratrol and turned them into “Olympic” athletes. Resveratrol improved oxygen use in their muscles, improved their aerobic capacity and gave them significantly increased endurance.4
I recommend adding foods rich in resveratrol to your diet. Foods with resveratrol include grapes and vaccinium berries like blueberries, bilberries and cranberries. Peanuts also have resveratrol.
Wine and related beverages are a particularly good source of concentrated resveratrol. Here’s a list of high-content wines:
|
Beverage |
Total Resveratrol (mg/L) |
Total Resveratrol in a 5 oz glass (mg) |
|
Muscadine wines |
14.1–40 |
2.12–6 |
|
Red wines (global) |
1.98–7.13 |
.30–1.07 |
|
Red wines (Spanish) |
1.92–12.59 |
0.29–1.89 |
|
Red grape juice (Spanish) |
1.14–8.69 |
0.17–1.30 |
|
Rose wines (Spanish) |
.43–3.52 |
.06–0.53 |
|
Pinot Noir |
.40–2.0 |
0.06–0.30 |
|
White wines (Spanish) |
0.05–1.80 |
0.01–0.27 |
A good dose is from 10-50 mg of resveratrol each day. For anti-aging, I recommend 100 mg. Usually, I advise you to eat natural foods to get the vitamins and nutrients you need. But if you need a higher dose of resveratrol, drinking an entire bottle of red wine each day is not a good idea. And you might not like berries. If this case, resveratrol supplements might be an option.
Another option is Itadori tea. It’s made from the root of the Japanese Knotweed, and it is high in resveratrol. This may be why it’s been used in Asia for over a thousand years as a traditional herbal remedy for heart disease and strokes.5
Another way you can power up your body and feel the energy of youth is with Coenzyme Q10. CoQ10 is the compound that gives your mitochondria the power to energize every cell in your body. This is crucial to the aging process, because when your cells are starved of energy, they age faster. CoQ10 is essential if you:
- Are concerned about the pumping power of your heart…
- Want to support your brain and ensure a continuous supply of energy…
- Are having those “senior moments”…
- Want to support a strong immune system…
- Know you don’t have the energy you used to and need an extra boost to keep going…
Most doctors make the mistake of thinking that these symptoms are a normal part of aging. But you can bypass many of these effects by giving your cells the building blocks they need to create a reliable stream of energy. This cellular energy powers your vital organs and helps keep them young.
The best natural source of CoQ10 is red meat, especially organ meat. Our ancestors had it made. They thrived on a diet of fresh beef heart and liver. You can, too, simply by adding grass-fed organ meat once or twice a week to your diet.
If you don’t like dining on hearts and liver, you can get almost the same level of this important coenzyme by eating a juicy steak a few times a week.
This will give you an idea of the concentrations of CoQ10 found in meats:6,7
|
Food Item |
Coenzyme Q10 (mcg/g) |
|
Pork heart |
126.8-203 |
|
Beef heart |
113.3 |
|
Pork |
24.3-41.1 |
|
Beef liver |
39.2 |
|
Beef |
31.0 – 36.5 |
|
Pork liver |
22.7 |
|
Chicken |
14.0 – 21.0 |
|
Pork ham |
20 |
Whether or not you’re a meat eater, your body still may be deficient. Here are three things that cause a deficiency:
- You could be missing other nutrients – Your body needs vitamins to use CoQ10. If you’re missing vitamins B2, B3, B6, B12, vitamin C, folic acid, or pantothenic acid, you may be in trouble.
- Drugs can interfere with it – Statins, beta blockers, diabetic medications or other drugs rob your body of CoQ10.
- Other factors can burn up your CoQ10 – Having excess body fat, repeatedly exercising for too long or chronic inflammation can use your CoQ10 stores.
If you have any of these issues, I recommend taking a CoQ10 supplement. Take 400 mg per day of the ubiquinone form of CoQ10 if you’re under 25. Take 50 mg of the more potent form, ubiquinol, if you’re over 25. Ubiquinol is eight times more powerful than ubiquinone, so you only need one-eighth as much.
A third way to counteract aging and make your body feel like it did years ago is with Dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA). This is the most abundant product of your adrenal glands. I call it the “anti-stress hormone.” It is the precursor used by your body in producing sex hormones like testosterone, estrogen, and progesterone.
You secrete DHEA when times are good – when you are well-fed, secure and free of stressors. The more DHEA in your body, the less effect stress will have on you. That’s because DHEA is the counter to another hormone called cortisol.
When you are under stress, cortisol tells your body “just get through the moment, damn tomorrow.” Since it inhibits maintenance and repair, cortisol accelerates aging.
Most hormones decline with age but cortisol, the stress hormone, actually increases with age. Cortisol plays havoc with your body because it’s like burning your candles at both ends.
DHEA fights off the effects of cortisol, and creates a slew of health benefits like
People with DHEA deficiency have been documented to experience cognitive decline, an aged appearance and a shortened lifespan.
A study in the Journal of the American Geriatric Society showed people between 60 and 80 with the highest levels of DHEA performed better on both cognitive and physical tests. Study authors even noted that those with higher levels of DHEA seemed younger.8
If you want to turn back the effects of our stressful modern environment, you can supplement with DHEA. I use it at my Wellness Clinic regularly. DHEA therapy has successfully treated many of my patients who suffer from lack of energy, depression and chronic fatigue syndrome.
It’s important for you to get your DHEA levels checked. Your doctor can perform the simple test.
After your levels have been checked, you can determine optimal dosing. A common starting dose that I use is 10 mg daily. DHEA is absorbed well and can be taken at any time but best mimics the natural daily levels when taken first thing in the morning.
These are just three simple ways to live younger longer, but there are many more. I’ve revealed all of them in detail in my new book “Reset Your Biological Clock.”
In it, you’ll discover the nutrients you need to reverse your genetic clock … how you can build a younger body … and even sleep like you did when you were a teenager. Get your copy here…
To Your Good Health,
Al Sears, MD
1 Cawthon, R.M., Smith, K.R., O’Brien, E., et al, “Association between telomere length in blood and mortality in people aged 60 years or older,” Lancet 2003, 361(9355):393-395
2 Harley, Calvin B., et al, “A Natural Product Telomerase Activator as Part of a Health Maintenance Program,” Rejuvenation Research Sept. 2010
3 Csiszar, Anna, et al, “Vasoprotective effects of resveratrol…,” Am. J. Physiol. Heart Circ. Physiol. 2008; 294: H2721-H2735
4 Lagouge, Marie, et al, “Resveratrol Improves Mitochondrial Function and Protects against Metabolic Disease…,” Cell 2006; Volume 127, Issue 6, Pages 1109-1122
5 Burns, Jennifer, Yokota, Takao, Ashihara, Hiroshi, et al, “Plant Foods and Herbal Sources of Resveratrol,” J. Agric. Food Chem., 2002, 50 (11), pp 3337–3340
6 Kamei, et al, “The distribution and content of ubiquinone in foods,” Internat. J. Vit. Nutr. Res. 56 (1986) 57-63
7 Mattila, et al, “Coenzymes Q9 and Q10: contents in foods and dietary intake,” Journal of Food Composition and Analysis 14 (2001) 409-417
8 Klatz, R.M., “Hormones of Youth,” Sports Tech Labs, 1998; Pg. 93
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