What Can Resveratrol Do For Me?
General October 14th, 2011Resveratrol is the latest Antioxidant substance to hit the world wide market. Does it really deserve all the media attention it has attracted?
Resveratrol is a powerful antioxidant compound that may provide protection for a myriad of degenerative disorders. Studies have shown the many benefits of resveratrol for fat loss, cardiovascular health, reduction of insulin resistance, alzheimers, anti-carcinogenic, and its anti-inflammatory effect. It has also been shown to extend life span in mammals by as much as 15% (10 human years) by increasing the activity of sirtuins, which prolong the life span of living organisms.
This plant based anti-oxidant has been deemed the “modern elixir of youth”, mopping up free radicals and preventing oxidative damage associated with aging. Some of these activities have been implicated in the cardiovascular protective effects attributed to resveratrol and also to red wine.
Prior to 2002, there had been no previous studies describing the potential effects of resveratrol on lifespan extension. However in the last 5 years, several researchers have reported that resveratrol is a potent activator of sirtuin enzymatic activity, mimics the beneficial effects of caloric restriction, retards the aging process and increases longevity in a number of organisms.
In addition, resveratrol seems to be effective in delaying the onset of a variety of age-related diseases in mammals, such as rodents. Therefore, it is possible that resveratrol may play a role in extending life duration and may act as an anti-aging agent.
Resveratrol in high doses has been shown to extend lifespan in some studies in invertebrates and to prevent early mortality in mice fed a high-fat diet. In a US study, researchers examined the effect of a low dose of dietary resveratrol and a calorie restricted (CR) diet, on the lifespan of mice. They fed mice from middle age (14-months) to old age (30-months) either a control diet, a low dose of resveratrol, or a CR diet and examined genome-wide transcriptional profiles.
The researchers reported a striking transcriptional overlap of CR and
resveratrol in heart, skeletal muscle and brain. Both dietary interventions inhibited gene expression profiles associated with cardiac and skeletal muscle aging, and prevented age-related cardiac dysfunction. Dietary resveratrol also mimicked the effects of CR in insulin mediated glucose uptake in the muscle.
Gene expression profiling suggested that both CR and resveratrol might
retard some aspects of aging, through alterations in chromatin structure and transcription. Resveratrol, at doses that could be readily achieved in humans, as demonstrated to fulfill the definition of a dietary compound that mimicked some aspects of CR and retarded some aging parameters.
Resveratrol also possesses chemopreventive and chemotherapeutic properties and has been shown to increase lifespan in yeast and metazoans, including mice. Genetic evidence and in vitro enzymatic measurements indicate that the deacetylase Sir2/SIRT1, an enzyme promoting stress resistance and aging, is the target of resveratrol. Similarly, down-regulation of insulin-like pathways, of which PI3K (phosphoinositide 3-kinase) is a key mediator, promotes longevity and is an attractive strategy to fight cancer.
Leanne James is a Naturopath at Ideal Health. For more information visit Resveratrol
