192 replies to this topic

[VictorBjoerk]

Has anyone heard any recent news from the wisconsin primate center? The monkeys should be quite old now and a lot of conclusion regarding how effective it is in primates could be drawn.

[TianZi]

There have been a couple of studies that I am aware of comparing a control group of rats placed on a typical CR protocol, against a second group of rats placed on the same CR protocol but also an exercise regimen. In one study, the rats in both groups lived about the same length of time, while in the other the rats that did CR + exercise lived a bit longer than the rats that did CR alone.

[kismet]

Is that news to you? Interesting new study (1)

(1) Med Sci Sports Exerc. 2009 Apr 3. [Epub ahead of print]
Sitting Time and Mortality from All Causes, Cardiovascular Disease, and Cancer.
Katzmarzyk PT, Church TS, Craig CL, Bouchard C.

[Mind]

The abstract:

PURPOSE:: Although moderate-to-vigorous physical activity is related to premature mortality, the relationship between sedentary behaviors and mortality has not been fully explored and may represent a different paradigm than that associated with lack of exercise. We prospectively examined sitting time and mortality in a representative sample of 17,013 Canadians 18-90 yr of age. METHODS:: Evaluation of daily sitting time (almost none of the time, one fourth of the time, half of the time, three fourths of the time, almost all of the time), leisure time physical activity, smoking status, and alcohol consumption was conducted at baseline. Participants were followed prospectively for an average of 12.0 yr for the ascertainment of mortality status. RESULTS:: There were 1832 deaths (759 of cardiovascular disease (CVD) and 547 of cancer) during 204,732 person-yr of follow-up. After adjustment for potential confounders, there was a progressively higher risk of mortality across higher levels of sitting time from all causes (hazard ratios (HR): 1.00, 1.00, 1.11, 1.36, 1.54; P for trend <0.0001) and CVD (HR:1.00, 1.01, 1.22, 1.47, 1.54; P for trend <0.0001) but not cancer. Similar results were obtained when stratified by sex, age, smoking status, and body mass index. Age-adjusted all-cause mortality rates per 10,000 person-yr of follow-up were 87, 86, 105, 130, and 161 (P for trend <0.0001) in physically inactive participants and 75, 69, 76, 98, 105 (P for trend = 0.008) in active participants across sitting time categories. CONCLUSIONS:: These data demonstrate a dose-response association between sitting time and mortality from all causes and CVD, independent of leisure time physical activity. In addition to the promotion of moderate-to-vigorous physical activity and a healthy weight, physicians should discourage sitting for extended periods.

Anyone know why moderate exercise would result in premature mortality? Where is the data that these researchers allude to.

[tunt01]

seems like an innocuous introductory remark about the subject, which this study attempts to examine further -- and dispels.

In addition to the promotion of moderate-to-vigorous physical activity and a healthy weight, physicians should discourage sitting for extended periods.

[heidee12]

Regular exercise reduces the risk for obesity, diabetes mellitus, hypertension, and heart disease not only in middle age but also in the retirement years, and the maintenance of aerobic power in older years may be associated with the ability to maintain independence. Sedentary elderly persons may lose physical fitness with age to the point of losing independence, and increased physical activity may be a way to prevent this deterioration as well as manage chronic disease.

[Mind]

Regular exercise reduces the risk for obesity, diabetes mellitus, hypertension, and heart disease not only in middle age but also in the retirement years, and the maintenance of aerobic power in older years may be associated with the ability to maintain independence. Sedentary elderly persons may lose physical fitness with age to the point of losing independence, and increased physical activity may be a way to prevent this deterioration as well as manage chronic disease.

I know. I have read innumerable abstracts affirming exercise as the near "magic bullet" to combat aging. There seems to be no question what-so-ever that exercise is good for the body and mind. That is why the first sentence of this abstract threw me for a loop. I could see how vigorous repetitive exercise could be associated with higher mortality (joints wear out and constant high metabolism could accelerate certain types of cellular damage accumulation), but moderate exercise as well?

[Michael]

I have read innumerable abstracts affirming exercise as the near "magic bullet" to combat aging.

They're full of shit. Hell, even human CR, if fully translatiable from the rodent model, would at best be a banged-up old Ginsu knife against aging . Exercise helps to prevent the premature incidence of age-related disease and disability; it does nothing at all about aging.

There seems to be no question what-so-ever that exercise is good for the body and mind. That is why the first sentence of this abstract threw me for a loop. I could see how vigorous repetitive exercise could be associated with higher mortality (joints wear out and constant high metabolism could accelerate certain types of cellular damage accumulation), but moderate exercise as well?

I've not read the full study, but I'm pretty sure that when they say it is "related to premature mortality" (note, BTW, the "premature" bit -- cf my comment above), they're referring to the well-established inverse relationship.

-Michael

Edited by Michael, 26 April 2009 - 02:01 PM.
Clarification

[Mind]

They're full of shit. Hell, even human CR, if fully translatiable from the rodent model, would at best be a banged-up old Ginsu knife against aging wink.gif . Exercise helps to prevent the premature incidence of age-related disease and disability; it does nothing at all about aging.

Right, I understand, it was bad wording on my part. Thanks for pointing that out. CR and exercise are well known to promote health (near magic bullets).

[Dom]

It all depends on how you want to live your life I guess. I'd much rather be exercising, eating 2,000 calories a day and in robust health over the CR lifestyle. As I'm still young anyway (21) by the time I'm pushing 60 there should be much more effective life extension techniques available than CR.

[kismet]

It all depends on how you want to live your life I guess. I'd much rather be exercising, eating 2,000 calories a day and in robust health over the CR lifestyle.

If I had to eat 2000kcal per day I'd just start full blown CR. Obesity avoidance diets are an awkward middle ground to me. You don't get the benefits of CR and you can never put on any amount of muscle, which, in theory, could provide benefits over a simple obesity avoidance diet (higher BMD, better stand against sarcopenia).

As I'm still young anyway (21) by the time I'm pushing 60 there should be much more effective life extension techniques available than CR.

You should realise (and I hope you do) that you won't really benefit from life extension therapies at the age of 60. Most of the damage will be done at that point. Your only hope will be reversal (á la SENS) or cryosuspension.

[nowayout]

Exercise helps to prevent the premature incidence of age-related disease and disability; it does nothing at all about aging.

I must admit that these "squaring the curve" findings are very puzzling to me. Most people drop dead from something. What these findings seem to be saying is that even if you eliminate those somethings, you will still drop dead right on cue, from nothing?

[stayin_alive]

Health nuts are going to feel stupid someday, dying of nothing.
— Redd Foxx

[kismet]

I must admit that these "squaring the curve" findings are very puzzling to me. Most people drop dead from something. What these findings seem to be saying is that even if you eliminate those somethings, you will still drop dead right on cue, from nothing?

I'm sure MR can explain it more correctly and eloquently, but it's simple, a. curve squaring does not work the way you think it does (I think someone in this thread conveyed the wrong message) and b. indeed, there are other diseases that will invariably kill you. First, you can't eradicate all the "age-related" diseases by any sort of curve-squaring measure anyway: cancer, CVD, dementias (AD, parkinson, etc), a trashed immune system, sarcopenia & osteoporosis, etc. Then, even if you could eliminate for instance CVD and cancer in the classical sense, people would be still dropping like flies. You need the whole package (or most of it) and you need to eliminate all the possible killers. It is believed that if you avoid classical CVD, cancer and most other causes of premature death (like most cenetarians do) amyloidosis will kill you. Apparently widespread cardiac amyloidosis is ubiquitous in the very old. Or any other type of cumulative damage e.g., and probably most prominently, decline of the cardiorespiratory system caused by elastin degredation, glycation, calcification, reduced tissue viability (necrotic/fibrotic and intracellular changes, prolly aging of the stem cell niche & reduced regenerative ability) and sarcopenia - your heart stops, inescapable death.

The issue is that the line between merely "age-related" and aging per se is blurry and even though SENS tries to deal with aging damage in the strictest sense, they still (have to?) deal with classical atherosclerosis and visceral fat because it is an important age-related killer. As a rule of thumb: most of the "deadly 7" SENS tries to fix are presumably basic, genuine aging damage, which is not stopped by exercise or curve-squaring supplements e.g. lipofuscin aggregates, mitochondrial aging, glycation damage, cancer and a lot of "trash" (amyloid, death-resistant cells, etc). Most of those problems cause the so called "age-related" diseases.

I hope my understanding is correct and the explanation makes sense to you.

Edited by kismet, 28 April 2009 - 09:39 PM.

[VictorBjoerk]

To put it very simple:

Exercise hasn't been demonstrated to SLOW DOWN the accumulation of all different kinds of molecular/cellular damage.

However it reduces the risk of disease that leads to death.

Therefore exercising people will die less prematurely than sedentary people, and they may live to the age where a weakened immune system or as Kismet wrote amyloid-related disease leads to death.

This most often happens later than heart attacks, many sorts of cancer etc. So it may offer a quite high probability of reaching your 90's or so where these kinds of death more often happen in contrast to 70's where heart disease related to atherosclerosis and cancer's (often partially lifestyle-related) are big killers.

Edited by VictorBjoerk, 29 April 2009 - 12:38 AM.

[TianZi]

The abstract:

PURPOSE:: Although moderate-to-vigorous physical activity is related to premature mortality, the relationship between sedentary behaviors and mortality has not been fully explored and may represent a different paradigm than that associated with lack of exercise. We prospectively examined sitting time and mortality in a representative sample of 17,013 Canadians 18-90 yr of age. METHODS:: Evaluation of daily sitting time (almost none of the time, one fourth of the time, half of the time, three fourths of the time, almost all of the time), leisure time physical activity, smoking status, and alcohol consumption was conducted at baseline. Participants were followed prospectively for an average of 12.0 yr for the ascertainment of mortality status. RESULTS:: There were 1832 deaths (759 of cardiovascular disease (CVD) and 547 of cancer) during 204,732 person-yr of follow-up. After adjustment for potential confounders, there was a progressively higher risk of mortality across higher levels of sitting time from all causes (hazard ratios (HR): 1.00, 1.00, 1.11, 1.36, 1.54; P for trend <0.0001) and CVD (HR:1.00, 1.01, 1.22, 1.47, 1.54; P for trend <0.0001) but not cancer. Similar results were obtained when stratified by sex, age, smoking status, and body mass index. Age-adjusted all-cause mortality rates per 10,000 person-yr of follow-up were 87, 86, 105, 130, and 161 (P for trend <0.0001) in physically inactive participants and 75, 69, 76, 98, 105 (P for trend = 0.008) in active participants across sitting time categories. CONCLUSIONS:: These data demonstrate a dose-response association between sitting time and mortality from all causes and CVD, independent of leisure time physical activity. In addition to the promotion of moderate-to-vigorous physical activity and a healthy weight, physicians should discourage sitting for extended periods.

Anyone know why moderate exercise would result in premature mortality? Where is the data that these researchers allude to.

I believe you have misread the highlighted text. The relationship alluded to is unclear from the text of the abstract--it could be a relationship that increases the risk of premature death, or decreases it. Based on other studies, we know what that relationship is: moderate to vigorous exercise reduces risk of premature mortality.

Edited by TianZi, 29 April 2009 - 06:20 AM.

[TianZi]

To put it very simple:

Exercise hasn't been demonstrated to SLOW DOWN the accumulation of all different kinds of molecular/cellular damage.

However it reduces the risk of disease that leads to death.

Therefore exercising people will die less prematurely than sedentary people, and they may live to the age where a weakened immune system or as Kismet wrote amyloid-related disease leads to death.

This most often happens later than heart attacks, many sorts of cancer etc. So it may offer a quite high probability of reaching your 90's or so where these kinds of death more often happen in contrast to 70's where heart disease related to atherosclerosis and cancer's (often partially lifestyle-related) are big killers.

Exercise has been shown to influence the rate of biological aging at least to the extent it influences shrinkage of telomore strands in immune cells, a key marker of aging. There have now been several studies demonstrating this, at least one of which was extensively discussed on this board (UK human study of identical twins). The difference biological age of said telomeres was the equivalent of a decade or more when comparing the most physically active study participants with the least. But that of course doesn't mean that exercise impedes every cause of aging.

[nowayout]

I must admit that these "squaring the curve" findings are very puzzling to me. Most people drop dead from something. What these findings seem to be saying is that even if you eliminate those somethings, you will still drop dead right on cue, from nothing?

I'm sure MR can explain it more correctly and eloquently, but it's simple, a. curve squaring does not work the way you think it does (I think someone in this thread conveyed the wrong message) and b. indeed, there are other diseases that will invariably kill you.

I may be wrong but the way I think curve squaring works is essentially this: The maximal lifespan is taken to be the age at which a given percentage (say for example 90%) of a population has died. The assertion that exercise does nothing but square the curve would imply that exercise does not move this age.

First, let me say that I am not aware of any study that proves that exercise does nothing but square the curve in humans. I believe (again maybe out of ignorance) that the question of whether exercise might extend the maximal lifespan up is still open. As for the rodent models, it seems possible, even likely, that they may be flawed.

As for humans, I find it hard to believe that exercise would not extend the maximal lifespan because of the following argument. Let's assume for ease of presenting the argument that the maximal lifespan of a sedentary population is 90, taken to be the cutoff point of 90% mortality. In other words, Out of every 1000 sedentary people, 900 will have died by age 90. At least some of these 900 will have died at or close to the age of 90, some of whose death will be from causes such as CVD that would have been postponed to past age 90 if they had exercised. Let's say there are 10 of these people. In other words, assuming no other effects of exercise on mortality, now only 890 out of a 1000 will have died by age 90, so the maximal lifespan is going to be more than 90. The only way exercise could not extend maximal lifespan would be if 10 or more people who would have died after age 90 will now die earlier than age 90 because of exercise. The claim that exercise does nothing but square the curve would require that these two effects exactly cancel each other out, which I find hard to believe.

Edited by andre, 29 April 2009 - 03:20 PM.

[kismet]

I may be wrong but the way I think curve squaring works is essentially this: The maximal lifespan is taken to be the age at which a given percentage (say for example 90%) of a population has died. The assertion that exercise does nothing but square the curve would imply that exercise does not move this age.

I wouldn't say any 'given percentage' more like a given percentange in the vicinity of 100%, as maximum life span is most often synonymous to tenth decile survivorship.

First, let me say that I am not aware of any study that proves that exercise does nothing but square the curve in humans. I believe (again maybe out of ignorance) that the question of whether exercise might extend the maximal lifespan up is still open

We can't answer the question for sure, but I believe it to be entirely irrelevant anyway. Everyone should exercise and even people on CR exercise modestly as far as I know. One thing we know for sure, exercise is pretty damn healthy, but whatever it does to life span, is not particularly impressive and not close to what is needed.

As for the rodent models, it seems possible, even likely, that they may be flawed.

You mean letting rats run on a wheel is not similar to well-designed resistance & endurance training in humans? Yep, that occurred to me too, but the epidemiology in humans is not that impressive either.

Your calculation is correct, by allowing people to reach their designated life span, even "curve squaring" can ever so slightly increase maximum life span, but it's a case of diminishing returns. If an intervention does not affect biological aging (for the sake of the argument let's say we're 100% sure exercise does not affect biological aging) or even one single but important & limiting aspect of biological aging, life extension will hit a wall. Many of the last 10% surviving may be already dying from old age per se (e.g. amyloid build-up). In such a case tenth decile survivorship won't be affected, but more people will reach that age... which equals to curve squaring. Maximal life span may be increased ever so slightly.
Interestingly even true anti-aging interventions slowing down one non-limiting aspect of aging may provide only minimal benefits...
Even if it affected biological aging to some degree - so what? Again, the answer is of no relevance to us, because even the most limited benefits of exercise should encourage everyone to exercise and any research into 'exercise in a pill' is a huge waste of money.

Edited by kismet, 30 April 2009 - 02:32 PM.

[JLL]

Wouldn't exercise and CR be a bad combination, since exercise increases calorie intake (or at least hunger)? So you could exercise lightly and eat 1,900 kcal, or not exercise and eat 1,750 kcal. Since the latter extends lifespan in mice more than the former, exercise seems harmful for CR people.

[TianZi]

Wouldn't exercise and CR be a bad combination, since exercise increases calorie intake (or at least hunger)? So you could exercise lightly and eat 1,900 kcal, or not exercise and eat 1,750 kcal. Since the latter extends lifespan in mice more than the former, exercise seems harmful for CR people.

JLL,

See my post above above. I already addressed this.

[Mind]

Men Who Get Active in Midlife Live Longer

For the study, Michaëlsson’s team collected data on 2,205 men who were 50 years old and then surveyed them again when they were 60, 70, 77 and 82. Each time, they were questioned about their level of physical activity as well as their weight, blood pressure, cholesterol levels, smoking habits and alcohol use.

After adjusting the data for other lifestyle factors, the researchers found that men who led sedentary lives were most likely to die during the follow-up period, and those who had the highest level of physical activity were least likely to die during that time.

In fact, men who exercised the most when they were 50 lived, on average, 2.3 years longer, and men who did moderate exercise lived 1.1 years longer than men who reported the lowest levels of exercise. It might take five to 10 years to see, but men who exercise in middle-age live longer, the researchers noted.

And compared with smoking cessation, “the reductions in mortality risk were found to be equal,” Michaëlsson said. “Everyone knows that smoking is hazardous for health and increases mortality risk, but it is not generally known that low physical activity has a similar impact on mortality risk as smoking.”

[Dmitri]

Here's more positive research, from an assistant professor at my university: The articles are in PDF format so I couldn't post the abstracts, thus I provided links to the papers themselves.

---Physical Activity Status, but not Age, influences Inflammatory Biomarkers and Toll-like Receptor 4. J Gerontol A Biol Sci Med Sci. 2006; 61(4) 388-393. (PDF): http://grants.hhp.co.....G 05-2006.pdf

---Toll-like receptor expression and physical activity status: A role in the underlying physiology of chronic inflammation? Exerc Sport Sci Rev. 2006 Oct;34(4):176-81(PDF) : http://grants.hhp.co.....R 10-2006.pdf

[lamoni]

Jack LaLanne is a good example of what exercise can do and not do...He hasn't escaped the aging process and I don't know how and if it has been slowed down for him.Let's see if he continues to live and exercise for the next few years...

Yes, he is a great example. diet and exercise can make you feel youthful and healthy but do not stall the aging process, they just postpone it a little. Aging is a result of the death urge. The death urge is a result of suffering. Suffering is a result of the identification with the ego. Yes, it's very disappointing to see people that dedicated their life to diet and exercise and still look old.

[Mind]

Aerobic activity may keep the brain young

The authors, who were sponsored in part by the National Institutes of Health's National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering, identified significant differences in the left and right middle cerebral artery regions confirmed by more than one statistical analysis.

The brain's blood vessels naturally narrow and become more tortuous with advancing age, but the study showed the cerebrovascular patterns of active patients appeared "younger" than those of relatively inactive subjects. The brains of these less active patients had increased tortuosity produced by vessel elongation and wider expansion curves.

The pilot study lays the foundation for future research to determine whether aerobic activity improves anatomy, if older patients with "younger" brains are more likely to engage in physical activity, and whether elderly adults who begin a program of aerobic activity can reverse the cerebrovascular, anatomic and functional changes associated with advancing age.

[Mind]

Endurance athletes and mixed sports athletes live longer than the general population and longer than power athletes.

I wonder if the difference between endurance/sports athletes and power athletes has to do with the extra weight that the power athletes carry around.

The health benefits of leisure-time physical activity are well known, however the effects of engaging in competitive sports on health are uncertain. This literature review examines mortality and longevity of elite athletes and attempts to understand the association between long-term vigorous exercise training and survival rates. Fourteen articles of epidemiological studies were identified and classified by type of sport. Life expectancy, standardised mortality ratio, standardised proportionate mortality ratio, mortality rate, and mortality odds ratio for all causes of death were used to analyse mortality and longevity of elite athletes. It appears that elite endurance (aerobic) athletes and mixed-sports (aerobic and anaerobic) athletes survive longer than the general population, as indicated by lower mortality and higher longevity. Lower cardiovascular disease mortality is likely the primary reason for their better survival rates. On the other hand, there are inconsistent results among studies of power (anaerobic) athletes. When elite athletes engaging in various sports are analysed together, their mortality is lower than that of the general population. In conclusion, long-term vigorous exercise training is associated with increased survival rates of specific groups of athletes.

[TianZi]

"Aging is a result of the death urge. The death urge is a result of suffering. Suffering is a result of the identification with the ego."

Huh? Uh, no.

[GoodFellas]

It would definitely increase a humans lifespan. For example, exercising makes you sleep a lot better.

[russianBEAR]

There are way too many factors for each individual to really make a conclusion one way or another.

Some people look in tip-top shape - but you find out about how much they like to drink almost as much as they exercise, or use cocaine on the weekends, so now it's triple stress on the heart for instance.

Heck, around here we got people playing football, basketball etc. in the playgrounds, while swilling liters upon liters of beer every day. That should increase their lifespan exponentially I would think 

Russia is probably the worst country to make that study since the average lifespan around here is about 50. 

Exercise has visible benefits, but it can also mean added stress. Someone mentioned something about exercising when you have a "general feeling of well-being". Well I usually exercise to get that feeling of well-being when I feel too angry at myself for lacking the will-power to do something I know I need. So I make myself do pushups, run etc. if I forget something or fuck up. Wish I had a coach for that though to take the soul out of me every day, put it back and then take it out again.

[Mind]

The evidence keeps accumulating that exercise is one of the best currently-available measures you can take against aging and age related disease.

Exercise slows the deterioration of telomeres.

The research found that intensive exercise prevents the shortening of telomeres — the DNA that bookends chromosomes and protects the ends from damage — much like the cap on the end of a shoelace.

The shortening of telomeres limits cells to a fixed number of divisions and can be regarded as a "biological clock." Gradual shortening of telomeres through cell divisions leads to aging on the cellular level and may limit lifetimes. When the telomeres become critically short, the cell dies.

The researchers measured the length of telomeres in blood samples from two groups of professional athletes and two groups who were healthy nonsmokers, but not regular exercisers.

"The most significant finding of this study is that physical exercise of the professional athletes leads to activation of the important enzyme telomerase and stabilizes the telomere," said Ulrich Laufs, the study's lead author and professor of clinical and experimental medicine at Saarland University in Homburg, Germany.