{"id":9764,"date":"2019-05-21T15:44:42","date_gmt":"2019-05-21T14:44:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nutrishield.com\/?p=9764"},"modified":"2021-06-24T12:19:49","modified_gmt":"2021-06-24T11:19:49","slug":"clear-out-zombie-cells-and-live-healthier-longer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/staging.nutrishield.com\/?p=9764","title":{"rendered":"Clear out \u2018zombie cells\u2019 and live healthier, longer"},"content":{"rendered":"\r\n
\"Clear<\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

And do it with food, not expensive pharma medicines<\/h1>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Investors in biotech companies are putting billions<\/em> into a new category of drugs that promise to extend the number of years you can stay healthy \u2013 and improve the quality of life in later years.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Dr Richard Miller is a leading gerontologist at the University of Michigan. In an article in New Scientist <\/em>headed \u2018The Age of Living Younger\u2019<\/em>, he states:<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

\r\n

\u201cWe have proven you can slow the ageing process using drugs\u201d.<\/p>\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

He\u2019s right. But Big Pharma\u2019s expensive drugs are not the only \u2013 or even the best way. Because you can get the same result with nutrition and food.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Why does so much illness appear age-related?<\/h3>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

The incidence of almost every debilitating chronic disease – heart disease, stroke, dementia, cancer, arthritis, vision impairment – increases suddenly around the age of 60.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

But it is not related to the passing of years. It is related to accumulated, unrepaired damage to DNA and to the cells that make up our tissues and organs \u2013 causing those organs to gradually fail. The damage accumulates because the body\u2019s cell repair mechanisms stop working properly. Prevent, limit or even reverse that damage, by boosting cell repair mechanisms, and you stay healthier for longer. But how?

<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Toxic dead ‘zombie’ cells need to be cleared<\/h3>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

The trillions of cells in your body are continually turning over. They replicate and ultimately die. Indeed, an estimated 50 billion die each day! \u00a0A normal cell death occurs through a process called apoptosis, and those dead cells are usually cleared away.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

\"Clear<\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

But occasionally the dead cells or debris from the dead cells is not cleared away. These are called senescent cells<\/strong> \u2013 cells that have suffered irreversible damage, but which have not been eliminated from the body.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Scientists sometimes refer to them as them junk or zombie cells.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Very recent research by Judith Campisi at the Buck Institute for Ageing<\/em> shows that these senescent cells secret a cocktail of damaging chemicals that poison surrounding tissues and cause chronic inflammation.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

We know inflammation underlies almost all age-related diseases and the Buck Institute explains how that inflammation occurs and directly links senescent cells to ageing itself and to cancer.

Lynne Cox, a biochemist at Oxford University, underlines the threat: \u201cSenescent cells are very bad for you \u2013 they destroy the tissues around them\u201d. <\/em><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Even a small number of uncleared senescent cells trigger problems \u2013 just as a rotten strawberry in a punnet can cause the rest to go bad.

(Hold that analogy in your mind, as it will have special significance as we unravel this latest science).<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

The huge cost of senescent cells<\/h3>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

A result of this damaging sequence – senescent cells poison surrounding tissues, which causes chronic inflammation, which causes multiple later life illnesses – is that the average person will live the last 12 – 18 years of their life with some sort of health issue and increasingly on medication.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

This is not only distressing for the individual, but a huge cost for society. 80% of healthcare costs in the US are linked to later-life degenerative disease! It\u2019s similar in the UK where the annual spend on healthcare is \u00a32,892 for every man, women and child and most of that is spent on later life.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

So, a drug that clears senescent cells and therefore extends healthy life span could literally save trillions.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

You are likely to live a somewhat longer life \u2013 say typically to around 90
\u2013 but, importantly, stay healthy, vigorous and productive until your final year or two. As one researcher put it, perhaps too bluntly,<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

\r\n

\u201cWe are not trying to fill care homes with geriatrics, we are trying to make sure you live actively and well to enjoy your pension to the full!\u201d<\/p>\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

You can see why bio-tech investors are so excited. But our interest is in doing this without Big Pharma\u2019s expensive, patented pills.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

How you can clear away senescent “zombie” cells<\/h4>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
\r\n
\"Clear<\/a><\/figure>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

If you take senescent cells from an old mouse and transplant them into a young mouse, it ages prematurely and suffers age-related diseases.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

The reverse is true. In 2011 researchers at the Mayo Clinic used a drug to clear senescent cells from aged mice \u2013 and it significantly extended the time they were disease-free and enabled them to function as young mice.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Removing senescent cells \u201cjump starts tissues’ natural repair mechanisms\u201d as a Johns Hopkins researcher puts it.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Other studies in 2016 and 2018, including at Newcastle University, showed that a range of illnesses \u2013 from simple frailty to heart disease to osteoporosis to dementia and even to osteoarthritis \u2013 was halted or even reversed by clearing senescent cells.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

As a leading researcher put it, we are now seeing:<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

\r\n

\u201c \u2026 how multiple diseases of ageing are being caused buy a single underlying cause\u201d.<\/p>\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

It is a genuine breakthrough in understanding how healthy lifespan can be extended.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

James Pickett, is head of research at the Alzheimer\u2019s Society, and was not involved in the Mayo study. His comment:<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

\r\n

\u201cThere hasn\u2019t been a new dementia drug in 15 years, so it\u2019s exciting to see the results of this promising study.”<\/p>\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

The importance of “senolytics”<\/h3>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

So how do we clear away senescent cells?\u00a0 The answer is with senolytics<\/strong> \u2013 defined as molecules that seek out, destroy and eliminate senescent cells.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

There are drugs that do this \u2013 like dasatinib, navitoclax and possibly the diabetes drug metformin \u2013 but none appears to work very well on their own, without being coupled with flavonoids<\/strong>.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

\"Clear<\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Flavonoids are a class of nutrients in fruits and vegetables that are as important to health as the vitamins and minerals that fruits and veggies also provide.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

They include the pigments in plants \u2013 like resveratrol<\/strong> (found in grape skin, red wine, blueberries and bilberries), quercetin<\/strong> (found in red onions, apples, green and black tea and grapes), beta carotene<\/strong>, lutein<\/strong> and lycopene <\/strong>(the red pigment found in tomatoes).<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Many flavonoids are linked to an anti-cancer effect, as well as being senolytic.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

A flavonoid with powerful senolytic action \u2013 fisetin<\/h4>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

But the most powerful flavonoid with senolytic activity appears to be a little-known pigment called fisetin<\/strong> \u2013 found in strawberries \u2013 at a level that\u2019s 6 times higher than in the next fruit, which is apples.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

\r\n
\"Clear<\/figure>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

A lead researcher at the Institute on the Biology of Ageing and Metabolism at the University of Minnesota told Newsweek magazine:<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

\r\n

\u201cWe\u2019re looking for drugs that can kill these damaged senescent cells that are very toxic to our bodies and accumulate as we get older. It turns out that fisetin is a natural product that we were able to show very selectively and effectively kills these senescent cells.\u201d<\/p>\r\n<\/blockquote>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

You\u2019ll note that she didn\u2019t suggest you just loaded up with strawberries. Unfortunately the default reaction from most researchers is to make a natural product into a drug!!<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Another proven senolytic \u2013 nicotinamide form of Vit B3<\/h4>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Another proven senolytic is nicotinamide<\/strong>, a form of vitamin B3, which unlike niacin, does not cause flushing. \u00a0Nicotinamide creates a blood chemical called NAD+, which clears DNA damage from especially mitochondrial cells \u2013 the tiny \u2018energy factories\u2019 in our cells. That should, in turn, improve energy levels.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

There are already supplements on the market that combine resveratrol, quercitin and nicotinamide. But they are jumping the gun. Partly because research on quercetin and resveratrol as senolytics, on their own, is not conclusive. And partly because senolytics are not the whole story.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

All-round cellular spring cleaning<\/h3>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

To create a truly comprehensive plan that will clear senescent cells and therefore prolong health, we need to include what are called mTOR inhibitors<\/strong>. O.K. it\u2019s a mouthful \u2013 but stay with me!<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

The mTOR pathway<\/h4>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

mTOR is a pathway within your cells that regulates the life cycle of that cell \u2013 its growth, repair and natural death. The science is rather complicated, but the key is this.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n