The Sunday Times - UK (2022-05-22)

AGEING

James McConnachie

Jellyfish Age Backwards
Nature’s Secrets to Longevity
by Nicklas Brendborg,
translated by Elizabeth DeNoma
and Nicklas Brendborg
Hodder Studio £16.99 pp288

If cancer, all cancer, were
cured tomorrow, then the
average life expectancy would
go up by a little more than
three years. If a cure for heart
disease were found we would
get, on average, an extra four.
If we could slow down
ageing, though, things might
improve more radically.
Because ageing, according
to the bright young Danish
molecular biologist Nicklas
Brendborg, is the “ultimate
cause” of disease — a door
that “continues to open ever
wider, until eventually
there might even be a sign
reading ‘Welcome’.”

Brendborg is young. He is

still doing his PhD, alongside

which he wrote this book, a

bestseller in Denmark last

year. It has nothing to do

with jellyfish — other than

mentioning the extraordinary

ability of one species to revert

from adult to polyp stage, as if

a butterfly could turn back into

a caterpillar. No, it is about

human ageing, being half a

survey of promising avenues

of scientific research into

human ageing and half a guide

to what we can do to improve

our personal futures based

on the evidence. In a field

characterised by overclaiming

and wishful thinking, it is

judicious, sensible and

refreshingly clear. And

fascinating.

Take Brendborg’s account

of fasting, a widely touted

recent fad. It’s true: when

laboratory rats and mice are

starved, they live 20 to 40 per

cent longer. They are also

fertile for longer, their immune

systems are more robust and

they get fewer cancers. They

look younger too.

Enthusiasts are already

restricting their calorific

intake or practising

“intermittent fasting”, but

there is a problem: the longer

the lifespan an animal has,

the less effective fasting seems

to be. It might not make any

difference to us, Brendborg

points out, but “it will

certainly make it seem like life

is very long”.

A lot of recent anti-ageing

research has the same

problem: you need to add the

words “... in mice” to the

headline. The antifungal

“natural antibiotic” drug

rapamycin, for instance,

extends lifespan by 20 per

cent... in mice. The molecule

spermidine, found in

wheatgerm, boosts the body’s

ability to clean up damaged

cells... in mice. Using gene

therapy to lengthen the

telomeres (the caps that stop

our chromosomes fraying)

delays ageing... in mice.

Lengthening telomeres,

unfortunately, also promotes

cancer. Because cells that

extend their life indefinitely,

in this way, are known in

another guise as cancer cells.

For a similar reason you might

want to avoid taking

antioxidant supplements,

which used to be — and

sometimes still are — touted

as a defence against ageing.

Designed to combat

“oxidative stress”, a kind of

cell damage that gets worse

as we age, antioxidants have

been widely discredited.

Dancing

disease

A story of medieval

madness tops Nick

Rennison’s historical

fiction picks

27

Full of gory

details

Antony Beevor’s new

study of Russia’s civil

war has horror on

every page

22

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Want to age well?

Here’s the secret

Forget red wine and fish, multivitamins and superfoods. A

young biologist reveals what really helps to guarantee a long life

Living at high

altitudes

seems to help

with ageing

And stretch High doses of

exercise are encouraged

THOMAS BARWICK/GETTY IMAGES

20 22 May 2022