May 15, 2024

Unlocking Healthy Longevity: Researchers Find Oxygen Restriction Extends Lifespan

In a brand-new study, researchers discovered a link between reduced oxygen consumption and longer life-span in lab mice, highlighting the potential of “oxygen constraint” in anti-aging. Mice bred to age quicker, when moved to an oxygen-restricted environment (11% oxygen, similar to the oxygen level at an altitude of 5000 meters), lived about 50% longer than mice in normal oxygen conditions (21%). This prolonged lifespan was not due to changes in food intake, recommending other mechanisms are at play. More research is required to comprehend the molecular systems behind this phenomenon and potential ramifications for human durability.
Lab analysis suggests for the very first time that minimized oxygen consumption may extend mammalian life-span.
Researchers have actually found that minimized oxygen consumption, or “oxygen constraint,” is linked to a longer life-span in lab mice. Mice in oxygen-restricted environments lived about 50% longer than those in normal conditions, showing postponed aging-associated neurological deficits. This suggests a new possible anti-aging strategy beyond recognized techniques like dietary limitation. Further study is required to identify its human applications.
For the first time, researchers have revealed that reduced oxygen consumption, or “oxygen limitation,” is connected with longer life expectancy in lab mice, highlighting its anti-aging potential. Robert Rogers of Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, United States, and colleagues present these findings in a research study released on May 23rd in the open access journal PLOS Biology.

In a new study, researchers found a link in between minimized oxygen intake and longer life-span in laboratory mice, highlighting the capacity of “oxygen restriction” in anti-aging. Mice bred to age faster, when moved to an oxygen-restricted environment (11% oxygen, comparable to the oxygen level at an elevation of 5000 meters), lived about 50% longer than mice in normal oxygen conditions (21%). Scientists have actually found that reduced oxygen consumption, or “oxygen restriction,” is linked to a longer life expectancy in lab mice. The scientists wondered if oxygen limitation extended their life expectancy just by causing the mice to eat more.

Research efforts to extend healthy life-span have determined a variety of chemical substances and other interventions that reveal promising effects in mammalian lab animals– for instance, the drug metformin or dietary constraint. Oxygen limitation has actually also been linked to longer lifespan in yeast, nematodes, and fruit flies. Its effects in mammals have actually been unknown.
To explore the anti-aging capacity of oxygen constraint in mammals, Rogers and coworkers performed laboratory explores mice bred to age faster than other mice while showing traditional indications of mammalian aging throughout their bodies. The scientists compared the life expectancies of mice living at typical atmospheric oxygen levels (about 21 percent) to the lifespans of mice that, at 4 weeks of age, had actually been relocated to a living environment with a lower proportion of oxygen (11 percent– similar to that experienced at an altitude of 5000 meters).
They discovered that the mice in the oxygen-restricted environment lived about 50 percent longer than the mice in regular oxygen levels, with a typical life-span of 23.6 weeks compared to 15.7 weeks. The oxygen-restricted mice likewise had delayed beginning of aging-associated neurological deficits.
Prior research has actually shown that dietary restriction extends the lifespan of the same type of fast-aging mice used in this brand-new research study. Therefore, the scientists wondered if oxygen restriction extended their life-span just by causing the mice to consume more. They discovered that oxygen limitation did not affect food consumption, suggesting other systems were at play.
These findings support the anti-aging potential of oxygen restriction in mammals, maybe consisting of humans. Nevertheless, comprehensive additional research study will be needed to clarify its potential advantages and brighten the molecular systems by which it runs.
Rogers includes, “We find that persistent continuous hypoxia (11% oxygen, equivalent to what would be experienced at Everest Base Camp) extends lifespan by 50% and delays the start of neurologic debility in a mouse aging design. While caloric constraint is the most extensively efficient and well-studied intervention to increase life expectancy and healthspan, this is the very first time that oxygen limitation has been demonstrated as useful in a mammalian aging design.”
Reference: “Hypoxia extends life expectancy and neurological function in a mouse design of aging” by Robert S. Rogers, Hong Wang, Timothy J. Durham, Jonathan A. Stefely, Norah A. Owiti, Andrew L. Markhard, Lev Sandler, Tsz-Leung To and Vamsi K. Mootha, 23 May 2023, PLOS Biology.DOI: 10.1371/ journal.pbio.3002117.