In a study from Columbia University and elsewhere, scientists found that caloric restriction can slow the pace of aging in healthy adults.
The CALERIE intervention slowed the pace of aging measured from participants’ blood DNA methylation using the algorithm DunedinPACE (Pace of Aging, Computed from the Epigenome).
CALERIE is an acronym for ‘Comprehensive Assessment of Long-Term Effects of Reducing Intake of Energy’.
The intervention effect on DunedinPACE represented a 2-3% slowing in the pace of aging, which in other studies translates to a 10-15% reduction in death risk, an effect similar to a smoking cessation intervention.
In the study, researchers aimed to test if calorie restriction also slows biological aging in humans.
It was the first-ever investigation of the effects of long-term calorie restriction in healthy, non-obese humans.
The team tested 220 healthy men and women at three sites in the U. S. who ate a 25% calorie restriction or normal diet for two years.
The team analyzed methylation marks on DNA extracted from white blood cells.
DNA methylation marks are chemical tags on the DNA sequence that regulate the expression of genes and are known to change with aging.
The researchers focused on three measurements of the DNA methylation data, sometimes known as “epigenetic clocks”.
The first two, the PhenoAge and GrimAge clocks, estimate biological age, or the chronological age at which a person’s biology would appear “normal”.
These measures can be thought of as “odometers” that provide a static measure of how much aging a person has experienced.
The third measure studied by the researchers was DunedinPACE, which estimates the pace of aging, or the rate of biological deterioration over time. DunedinPACE can be thought of as a “speedometer”.
The team found in contrast to the results for DunedinPace, there were no effects of the intervention on other epigenetic clocks.
The difference in results suggests that dynamic ‘pace of aging’ measures like DunedinPACE may be more sensitive to the effects of intervention than measures of static biological age.
The study found evidence that calorie restriction slowed the pace of aging in humans.
But calorie restriction is probably not for everyone. The findings are important because they provide evidence from a randomized trial that slowing human aging may be possible.
They also showed of the kinds of effects in trials of interventions that could appeal to more people, like intermittent fasting or time-restricted eating.
A follow-up of trial participants is now ongoing to determine if the intervention had long-term effects on healthy aging.
In other studies, slower DunedinPACE is associated with reduced risk for heart disease, stroke, disability, and dementia.
If you care about health, please read studies about how Mediterranean diet could protect your brain health, and this plant nutrient could help reduce high blood pressure.
For more information about health, please see recent studies that olive oil may help you live longer, and vitamin D could help lower the risk of autoimmune diseases.
The study was conducted by Daniel Belsky et al and published in the journal Nature Aging.
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