Diet is our best medicine. What we eat has a big contribution to how we age. The results of a recent study is another scientific prove for that.
The study showed how food can dramatically influence many of the our processes on a cell level. The researchers were interested in whether drugs or diet were more powerful in remodeling nutrient-sensing and other metabolic pathways, as well as whether drugs and diet interacted in ways that made them more or less effective. They used a mouse model and investigated influence of 40 different treatments, each with varying levels of protein, fat and carbohydrate balance, calories and 3 anti-aging drugs on the liver, which is a key organ in regulating metabolism.
The results showed that calorie intake and the balance of macronutrients (protein, fats and carbohydrates) had a far more powerful effect than drugs. Moreover, drugs turned to dampen significantly the responses of our body to diet rather than reshape them. This means that changing a diet would better work to slow down aging and improve metabolic health rather than taking the (studied) drugs.
For those, who are more interested in the details:
The researchers found that both calorie intake and the balance of macronutrients in the diet had a strong impact on our liver. Protein and total calorie intake had a powerful effect not just on metabolic pathways, but also on basic processes that control the way our cells function. For example, the amount of protein eaten influenced activity in the mitochondria, which are our ‘powerhouses’ that produce energy.
The amount of protein and dietary energy eaten turned to influence how accurately cells translate their genes into the different proteins needed to help cells function properly and to make new cells. These 2 basic processes are linked to aging.
As for the drugs, they mainly dampened the cell’s metabolic response to diet, rather than fundamentally re-shaped them.
However, the researchers also found some more specific interactions between the biochemical effects of the drugs and diet composition. One anti-aging drug (resveratrol) downregulated the effects of dietary fat and carbohydrates on the cell functioning, while a cancer (rapamycin) and another diabetes drug (metformin) both blocked the effects of dietary protein on the energy-producing mitochondria.
The researchers believe that the results of their study would be easily replicated in people as both mice and people have the same nutrient-signaling pathways.
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