NEW YORK: A preliminary study in humans suggests that reducing calories may well extend life, researchers report in this week’s Journal of the American Medical Association.
“A lot of evidence already exists to suggest that calorie restriction increases maximum life span in several animal species. However, there hasn’t been any proof of it being the case in humans,” co-author Dr Eric Ravussin, from Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge, said.
“This is the first step toward looking at the beneficial effects of caloric restriction in humans.”
Ravussin and his team enrolled 48 healthy, overweight (but not obese) men and women in a six-month trial looking at the effects of calorie reduction. Participants were assignet to one of four groups: a control group, which followed a normal diet; a colorie restriction group, which received 25% less calories than the daily requirement; a third group, which exercised and reduced calorie intakes (12.5% calorie restriction and 12.5% increase in energy expenditure); or a group that received a very low-calorie diet, starting with 890 kcal a day and then increased to maintain a 15% weight loss.
After six months, while patients in the control group lost about 1% of their weight, both calorie restriction groups (with or without exercise) loss about 10%. Individuals on the very low-calorie diet lost nearly 14% of their weight.
The researchers also observed lower blood levels of insulin after fasting and a lower body temperature in all participants who undertook a restricted calorie regimen.
“Body temperature and blood insulin levels are markers of longevity like gray hair or wrinkles can be,” said Ravussin.
“It has been shown both in animals and humans that those with lower body temperature tend to live longer, and so do those with lower fasting insulin levels.”
Another important finding, according to Ravussin, was that less DNA damage, which leads to aging, seemed to occur in patients with lower calorie intakes. –Reuters
Biological benefits of calorie restriction:
Cardiovascular: There is a reduction of blood pressure associated with reduced sympathetic activity. There is a reduction of low-density lipoprotein cholesterol and an increase in high-density lipoprotein-2 concentrations.
Improved insulin sensitivity: Calorie restriction is associated with reduced abdominal fat which is the source of many inflammatory mediators known to cause injury to blood vessels and promote heart attacks.
Gene expression: There is no data in humans, but in animal studies calorie restriction prevents the changes in gene expression seen with aging in skeletal muscle, brain and heart.-Source: University of Toronto
Source: theSun, 6 April 2006
This afternoon,erm...wait, I should say yesterday afternoon, I took a free copy of theSun from the university before I came back. I scan through the newspaper just now and found this article quite interesting. That is why I post in my blog and share with my blog readers. Hope you do benefit from this article.
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9 comments:
BUT WHY???!! i love eating. especially unhealthy sweet with high calories food.
ok..i promise to cut down on those kinda food when i'm 30. haha.
and u'r so rajin in typing out the whole article! =)
i love eating too. Especially i ate a lot high cal food recently. I'm not rajin la, I post this here to remind me to cut down on these food.haha~~
In addition...remind me to keep fit too.. :p
lol, for li-lynn's case it doesnt really matter cause shes still so thin after eating all those high calorie food. XD
ive been eating loads of vege this few weeks. tring to cut down on rice and meat. and ive stop drinking coke for like a week. damn i miss my coke.
good..don forget exercise...ai..no one wan to accomapny me exercise//~~
Goh, how's the result of cutting down rice and meat??
Crayn,you stay so far, want to accompany you also cannot lar!haha
ive actually lost a kg in a week from cutting down on meat and rice. i guess must be more hardcore a bit if i really want it to work. XD
Haha I read something similar in New Scientist recently as well. I also read something about being able to develop more brain connective tissues if you are always hungry. A certain hormone (if you are interested it’s called “Ghrelin”) we produce to tell our brain that we are hungry somehow also improve learning and memory ¬¬.
This hormone binds the hypothalamus and then our brain will tell us we are hungry, but this hormone also interacts with hippocampus (for learning and memorising). Hence we get more brain connective cells..
First time I read this I was like ‘argh I have an excuse not to eat breakfast now’ but afterwards it made some sense. When we are hungry, our brain must be activity so that we can find food to feed ourselves..But there is a lot of downside of not eating proper meals.
If you are interested..this article was in issue No2540 (Feb this year I think) of New Scientist :D
Enjoy reading theories ^^
i shall study then when im hungry. even better, ill just starve to death just for studying. XD
Louise, thanks for sharing. It sounds interesting! I think i should go and look for that mag!
Aik Wye, for me, my brain normally can't function when i'm hungry. haha
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