So, the news has been a-flurry with research breakthroughs related to aging and longevity. To add to the pile is a recent study which suggests that lowering core body temperature will also lengthen life span.
Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, Calif., report in tomorrow's issue of Science that solely by lowering the core body temperature of mice, they could extend the lives of their experimental subjects by as much as 20 percent. They accomplished this feat--conferring an extra three months of life to the animals, which typically live just over two years--without varying diet.
To accomplish this deception biologically, Bartfai and Conti genetically engineered mice to overexpress uncoupling protein 2, which causes the mitochondria in cells to produce heat instead of ATP, the fuel source of cellular activity. They focused this effect on the hypocretin neurons, which are brain cells in the lateral hypothalamus. As the heat diffused through the brain, it reached the preoptic area, an anterior section of the hypothalamus and the specific region that regulates body temperature. Feeling the heat, the preoptic area caused core body temperatures in the mice to decrease by 0.3 degree Celsius to 0.5 degree C.
So, the story of living longer is shaping up to look something like this: Resveratrol, found in red wine, makes mice live 20% longer. Caloric restriction of about 30% also extends life span. And now, tricking the brain into thinking its too hot (and thereby lowering body temperature) also increase longevity.
By this logic, the oldest people will live their lives drunk, emaciated, and sweaty. If it wasn't for all that heroin and drunk driving, Paris Hilton, Lindsey Lohan, and Nichole Richie might have buried us. (ok, i'm kidding here......)
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- I've known a number of researchers (and "piers"...nyuk nyuk) from Scripps down through the years. A few have been really cold fish, let me tell you, and old. So it seems to prove out in the field.
I'm not surprised Big Bang. Perhaps this is good for me, and I'll live forever? My ex's seem to think i'm pretty cold. :D
Seriously, as someone living in Michigan, just gives me another reason to hate all those people living in Tahiti. Beautiful place and living longer? Screw them!
I'm thinking some more research needs to be done on us about-to-be-too-cold-for-comfort Midwesterners. While I'm sure the deep-freeze mice lived longer, I wonder what effect such a lifestyle would have on Wisconsoners. And regardless of how much wine you drink or the temperature of your thermostat, how do you calculate a lifespan when deep-fried everything, falling through the ice, and freezing to death are all risks one must face?
FWIW, a quote from Clif Saper's "Perspectives" article about this at the front of the magazine:
But few people would choose a life-style that limits their caloric intake, and Conti et al. provide the first test of the hypothesis that lowering the body temperature of a mammal prolongs life. The substantial increase of life span raises the question of whether mild hypothermia of 0.3� to 0.5�C might be easier to tolerate than a lifetime of starvation, as a way to increase longevity. Although at present there is no practical way for humans to achieve prolonged hypothermia, the results of Conti et al. suggest a potential gene therapy approach. One could imagine, for example, stereotaxic injections into the hypothalamus of an adeno-associated virus or lentivirus engineered to provide long-term expression of an uncoupling protein, to warm the hypothalamus just enough to extend life span.
If life-span extension could be this simple, one might wonder whether 37�C is indeed the optimal body temperature for humans, and why evolution has not selected for a lower body temperature and longer life span. However, there would be little evolutionary pressure to extend the number of years of life after reproduction is finished. A more important question for humans contemplating a hypothermic life-style might be whether the lower body temperature in the UCP-2 transgenic mice might cause other physiological or behavioral problems, such as changes in reproductive physiology, which might select against a lower body temperature. The reasons for the remarkable stability of body temperature among mammals, and why this temperature has been selected by evolution, remain obscure, although one would certainly want to know the consequences of hypothermia before pursuing it as a way to increase life span.
It's interesting that the male experimental rats gained more weight than the control group on an ad lib diet, yet the lived longer. This type of intervention may not be so good for humans due to the possibility of metabolic syndrome.
Shelley, when you are ready to live drunk and sweaty, just let me know. We can skip the emaciated part.
Keith Richards & Mick Jagger are going to live to 150 giving "farewell concerts" till the day they die.
Hi there, I am running a blogterview series with life extension supporters/bloggers if you are interested on
http://pimm.wordpress.com/
even with scholars not just with activists.
My life extension questions are:
1. What is the story of your life extension commitment?
2. Is it a commitment for moderate or maximum life extension?
3. What is your favourite argument supporting human life extension?
4. What kind of moderate life extension technologies have the chance to become successful, and when?
5. What is the most probable technological draft of maximum life extension, which technology or discipline has the biggest chance to reach it earliest? When?
6. What can blogs and other websites do for LE?
Feel free to answer me, cheers,
Attila.
Saper's comment kinda hints at a general problem with manipulating lifespan via temperatue. All life is basically a [really complex] system of chemical reactions. All chemical reactions have reaction rates that are dependent on temperature but they do not have the same curves of temperature dependence. A few degrees might be ok, and if that buys you years and years then go for it. But the "side effects"? I expect they would number in the thousands.
Is there another way to look at these findings?:
reduced body temp extends lifespan....
makes me wonder, and where better to ask, we have biological clocks that count the hours and know the time of day and time of month. Other things like puberty onset may be on a clock but are exquisitly sensitive to certain hormone-like pollutants.
But do we have a clock that counts the years? If we did, what winds it? I used to imagine that it was the calories we burned since calorie restriction is a longevity enhancer across many species. Now temp is indicated? it would be an excellent candidate since hardly any kind of chemical reaction rate is not a function of temperature.
WOULD this finding help us isolate the "year" clocks if any there be?