Exercise Keeps you Young ?

Could it be true that exercise keeps you young ?

One hears the stories about someone running marathons and then keeling over with a heart attack. It can be disheartening. Should I join the couch potatoes ?

A group of researchers in Germany faced with the fact that the underlying molecular mechanisms of the vasculo-protective effects of physical exercise are incompletely understood set up an exercise project to find out what happens to the Telomeres.

If there is a 'bottom line' then it is to get your V02 Max up and keep it up and the Telomeres will stay long and young!

Telomere erosion is a central component of aging. Telomeres are the 'caps' the ends of the chromosomes and they protect the chromosomes from damage but when the telomeres are themselves eroded away, the cell can no longer divide. It just dies and nothing takes its place.

 The study in Germany examined the effects of exercising on telomere biology:

• Firstly in mice 
• Secondly the effects of long-term endurance training on telomere biology in humans.

The 50-ish marathon runners had telomeres only slightly shorter than 20-ish runners but the sedentary 50 year olds had already lost 40% of the telomere length.

Telomeres made news in December 2009 when Nobel prize for Medicine was won for research on Telomeres. Watch the interview in Stockholm with the three winners: 

• Elizabeth Blackburn
• Carol Greider
• Jack Szostak

I'm not sure if the nutritional treatment to keep the telomeres at a healthy length is snake oil or not but this is an interesting one

•  watch the presentation by Dr Joseph Raffaele.