Recent Longevity News for the week ending 7/11/18

The commies at Facebook disapproved this version because it had the word "testosterone".  Click here for the Facebook version.

Long-Term Testosterone Reverses Diabetes in Some Hypogonadal Men - Medscape, 7/5/18 - "After almost a decade of testosterone injections every 3 months, 22% of men with type 2 diabetes and hypogonadism had diabetes remission, in unexpected findings from a small registry study that was only designed to assess a new preparation of the hormone ... In the total group of 133 patients, there was not a single patient who did not benefit from testosterone therapy"

Heavy Drinking Linked to Decreased Grey Matter in Young Adults - Medscape, 7/4/18 - "Neuroimaging studies have demonstrated that heavy alcohol consumption is connected to smaller grey matter volume in adults, and pathology studies have linked heavy alcohol use with white matter atrophy and focal neuronal loss ... Alcohol is simply toxic for developing brains"

Exposure to paint, varnish, other solvents linked to increased risk of MS - Science Daily, 7/3/18 - "The researchers determined that the MS genes and exposure to solvents combined were responsible for an estimated 60 percent of the risk of developing MS"

Feeling young could mean your brain is aging more slowly - Science Daily, 7/3/18 - "Using MRI brain scans, researchers found that elderly people who feel younger than their age show fewer signs of brain aging, compared with those who feel their age or older than their age ... those who felt younger than their age showed increased gray matter volume in key brain regions ... The researchers hypothesize that those who feel older may be able to sense the aging process in their brain ... If somebody feels older than their age, it could be sign for them to evaluate their lifestyle, habits and activities that could contribute to brain aging and take measures to better care for their brain health"

Metformin reverses established lung fibrosis - Science Daily, 7/3/18 - "Pulmonary fibrosis can develop after lung injuries like infections, radiation or chemotherapy, or it can have an unknown cause ... Interestingly, the drug that accelerated the resolution of lung fibrosis is metformin, which is a safe and widely used agent for non-insulin-dependent diabetes" - See metformin at the Antiaging Store.

Plastic straws aren’t just bad for the environment — they can be bad for your body - Washington Post, 7/3/18 - "Gas and bloating ... Cavities ... Chemicals ... Wrinkles ... Excess sugar and alcohol consumption"

Supplemental antioxidants may reduce exacerbations in cystic fibrosis - Science Daily, 7/2/18 - "During the 16-week study of 73 patients (36 received supplemental antioxidants), 53 percent of the antioxidant-treated group experienced 28 exacerbations, compared to 68 percent of the control group who experienced 39 exacerbations"

Can Coffee Extend Your Life? - WebMD, 7/2/18 - "People who drank eight or more cups of coffee a day had a 14 percent lower risk of dying over a 10-year study period, compared with those who didn't drink coffee ... For those who drank six to seven cups a day, the risk was cut 16 percent ... Coffee contains more than 1,000 biological compounds, including potassium and folic acid, known to have an effect on the body"

Drinking coffee, even decaf or instant, may help you live longer - CNET, 7/2/18 - "After 10 years of the study, results showed that non-coffee drinkers were more likely to have died than those who didn't drink coffee ... Decaf, instant, fancy pricey coffee from that gourmet shop down the road -- apparently the type of coffee doesn't matter" - Speaking of coffee:

• SpaceX Dragon delivers Death Wish Coffee to ISS astronauts - CNET, 7/2/18 - "Death Wish Coffee says its product is "200 percent more caffeinated than your average coffee house cuppa joe."" - See Death Wish Coffee at Amazon.com.

Poor sleep quality linked to atrial fibrillation - Science Daily, 6/26/18 - "individuals with more frequent nighttime awakenings while trying to sleep more often carried a diagnosis of AF ... Within a subset of these individuals who had undergone formal sleep studies, they found that less REM sleep in particular predicted future AF ... These results provide more evidence that sleep quality is important to cardiovascular health and specifically to AF ... While there are several available treatments for AF, prevention of the disease would be ideal. The good news is that sleep quality can be modifiable and is something that at least to some degree is under the control of the individual. It's possible that improving sleep hygiene, such as performing regular exercise, getting to bed at a reasonable hour on a regular basis, and avoiding viewing screens before bed as well as caffeine later in the day, might help stave off AF"

Many older adults are deficient in vitamin B12 and folate - Science Daily, 6/26/18 - "Both vitamin B12 and folate are essential for nerve function, brain health and the production of red blood cells and DNA. Numerous studies have shown that low nutritional status of folate and B12 are linked to poor long-term health, especially among older people ... One in eight adults over 50 were low to deficient in vitamin B12 while one in seven were low to deficient in folate ... The prevalence of low or deficient folate increased with age, from 14% among those aged 50-60 years to 23% among people over 80 years old. Low folate status was also more common in smokers, the obese, and those who lived alone ... Low or deficient vitamin B12 was more common in smokers (14%), people who lived alone (14.3%) and those from lower socio-economic backgrounds (13%) ... Use of both vitamin B12 and folic acid supplementation was low, with higher rates among women than men but less than 4% overall taking supplements of either vitamin" - See vitamin B12 and methylfolate at Amazon.com.

Dietary supplement increases muscle force by 50% percent in the Duchenne muscular dystrophy mouse model - Science Daily, 6/28/18 - "After ten days of treatment, researchers found that mice given N-acetylglucosamine had 50% increased muscular strength compared to mice from the control group" - See n-acetylglucosamine at Amazon.com.

Gut bacteria markers could be a 'smoking gun' for liver disease - Science Daily, 6/25/18 - "NAFLD starts with the build-up of fat in liver and can lead to scarring and cirrhosis, where the scarred organ eventually shrinks and the risks of liver failure and cancer increase. Fatty liver also increases the risk of developing type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular diseases ... Their analysis also uncovered a link between the presence of fatty liver disease and subtle changes in the makeup of the microbiome itself. The more advanced the disease, the more the total number of genes encoded by gut bacteria began to decrease, an indirect measure that the microbiome was less diverse -- made up of fewer different types of bacteria ... Researchers have already discovered more than 10 million active genes linked to the microbes in our gut -- 500 times the number of genes in the human genome -- but their function remains largely unknown. However, previous studies have shown the number of active microbial genes drops dramatically with metabolic disorders, such as obesity ... According to the team, the drop in microbial diversity reveals that key gut bugs may be lost in patients with fatty liver disease" - See probiotic products at Amazon.com.

Flight Attendants May Have Higher Cancer Rates - Medscape, 6/26/18 - "flight attendants were 51 percent more likely to develop breast cancer. They also had more than double the risk of melanoma and more than quadruple the odds of being diagnosed with other forms of skin cancer ... Scientists have long suspected that flight attendants' cancer risk might be affected by their exposure to naturally occurring radiation at high altitudes, shift work, time zone changes that disrupt sleep cycles, and poor cabin air quality"

Metformin Linked to Lower Mortality in Diabetes With Dementia - Medscape, 6/26/18 - "For older patients with both diabetes and dementia, taking metformin was associated with a reduction in all-cause mortality while insulin was associated with an increased risk for heart failure (HF) ... diabetic patients with dementia who take a dipeptidyl peptidase-4 inhibitor (DPP-4i) have a higher rate of myocardial infarction (MI) ... For all-cause mortality, metformin treatment was associated with a beneficial effect, with a hazard ratio (HR) of 0.83 ... On the other hand, risk for death was increased among insulin users (adjusted HR, 1.16"

Abstracts from this week:

Role of Oral Nutritional Supplements Enriched with β-Hydroxy-β-Methylbutyrate in Maintaining Muscle Function and Improving Clinical Outcomes in Various Clinical Settings - J Nutr Health Aging. 2018;22(6):664-675 - "Aging and disease-related malnutrition are well associated with loss of muscle mass and function. Muscle mass loss may lead to increased health complications and associated increase in health care costs, especially in hospitalized individuals. High protein oral nutritional supplements enriched with β-hydroxy-β-methylbutyrate (HP-ONS+HMB) have been suggested to provide benefits such as improving body composition, maintaining muscle mass and function and even decreasing mortality rates. The present review aimed to examine current evidence on the effect of HP-ONS+HMB on muscle-related clinical outcomes both in community and peri-hospitalization patients. Overall, current evidence suggests that therapeutic nutrition such as HP-ONS+HMB seems to be a promising tool to mitigate the decline in muscle mass and preserve muscle function, especially during hospital rehabilitation and recovery" - See HMB at Amazon.com.

Resveratrol treatment may preserve the erectile function after radiotherapy by restoring antioxidant defence mechanisms, SIRT1 and NOS protein expressions - Int J Impot Res. 2018 Jul 5 - "Radiotherapy (RT) for prostate cancer (PC) can cause erectile dysfunction (ED) by damaging neurovascular structures with oxidative stress. In this study, we evaluated the effects of resveratrol, an antioxidant, on post-RT ED. Fifty rats in five groups were evaluated; control (C), prostate-confined radiotherapy with short- and long-term vehicle or resveratrol treatment ... Radiotherapy caused a decrease in sirtuin-1, nNOS, and eNOS protein expressions. These parameters were reversed by resveratrol treatment ... Resveratrol preserved the metabolic pathways involved in erectile function and provided functional protection. Resveratrol can be used as a supplementary agent in patients undergoing radiotherapy to preserve erectile function" - See resveratrol products at Amazon.com.

Selegiline reduces adiposity induced by high-fat, high-sucrose diet in male rats - Br J Pharmacol. 2018 Jul 3 - "Certain monoamine-oxidase (MAO) inhibitors have been shown to reduce body weight, although their effect on metabolic parameters have not been investigated. Here we assessed the effect of a widely used, selective MAO-B inhibitor, selegiline, on metabolic parameters in high-fat, high-sucrose diet-induced rat model of obesity ... Male Long-Evans rats were fed with control (CON) or high-fat (20%), high-sucrose (15%) diet (HFS) for 25 weeks. From week 16 groups of animals received subcutaneous injections of 0.25 mg kg-1 selegiline (CON+S and HFS+S) or vehicle (CON, HFS) once daily ,,, Selegiline decreased whole body fat, subcutaneous and visceral adiposity as measured by computer tomography and epididymal fat weight in the HFS group as compared to HFS placebo animals without influencing body weight. Oral glucose tolerance test and insulin tolerance test results showed impaired glucose homeostasis in HFS and HFS+S groups despite unchanged insulin levels in the blood plasma and pancreas. HFS induced expression of Srebp-1c, Glut1, and Mip1α in adipose tissue, which was alleviated by selegiline treatment ... These results suggest the potential benefit of selegiline to mitigate harmful effects of visceral adiposity" - See deprenyl (selegiline) at The Antiaging Store.  I've been taking 5 mg per day since Moby Dick was a minnow.

The effect of low vitamin D status on sexual functioning and depressive symptoms in apparently healthy men: a pilot study - Int J Impot Res. 2018 Jul 5 - "Hypovitaminosis D is associated with sexual dysfunction in apparently healthy women and with erectile dysfunction in men with the presence of concomitant disorders. This study was aimed at investigating sexual functioning and depressive symptoms in young men with low vitamin D status. The study included 15 apparently healthy men (18-40 years old) with vitamin D deficiency (group A), 16 subjects with vitamin D insufficiency (group B), and 16 men with normal vitamin D status (group C) ... Compared with healthy men, subjects with vitamin D deficiency obtained lower scores for erectile function, orgasmic function, and sexual desire, while individuals with vitamin D insufficiency lower scores only for erectile function. Erectile dysfunction was more prominent in group A than group B. The total BDI-II score was higher in group A than in the other study groups. The results of the study suggest that low vitamin D status impairs male sexual functioning and severity of sexual dysfunction correlates with the degree of hypovitaminosis D" - See vitamin D at Amazon.com.

Effect of anthocyanin supplementation on cardio-metabolic biomarkers: a systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials - Clin Nutr, Jun 18 - "anthocyanin supplementation had significant effect on HOMA-IR (MD: -0.21 ... Anthocyanin supplementation had significant effects on total cholesterol (TC) and low density lipoprotein (LDL) for more than 300 mg/day intervention for more than 12 weeks. The dose and duration of supplementation were the potential sources of heterogeneity among most of the trials" - [Nutra USA] - See anthocyanins at Amazon.com.

Oral Intake of Low-Molecular-Weight Collagen Peptide Improves Hydration, Elasticity, and Wrinkling in Human Skin: A Randomized, Double-Blind, Placebo-Controlled Study - Nutrients. 2018 Jun 26;10(7) - "Collagen-peptide supplementation could be an effective remedy to improve hydration, elasticity, and wrinkling in human skin. The aim of this study was to conduct a double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled trial to clinically evaluate the effect on human skin hydration, wrinkling, and elasticity of Low-molecular-weight Collagen peptide (LMWCP) with a tripetide (Gly-X-Y) content >15% including 3% Gly-Pro-Hyp. Individuals (n = 64) were randomly assigned to receive either placebo or 1000 mg of LMWCP once daily for 12 weeks ... Compared with the placebo group, skin-hydration values were significantly higher in the LMWCP group after 6 weeks and 12 weeks. After 12 weeks in the LMWCP group, visual assessment score and three parameters of skin wrinkling were significantly improved compared with the placebo group. In case of skin elasticity, one parameter out of three was significantly improved in the LMWCP group from the baseline after 12 weeks, while, compared with the placebo group, two parameters out of three in the LMWCP group were higher with significance after 12 weeks" - [Nutra USA] - See collagen supplements at Amazon.com.

Exploration of the association between dietary fiber intake and depressive symptoms in adults - Nutrition. 2018 Mar 21;54:48-53 - "A total of 16 807 adults ages 20 y or older were included in this study. Dietary intakes of total, cereal, vegetable, and fruit fiber were inversely associated with depressive symptoms in unadjusted model and multivariate-adjusted model 1. In multivariate-adjusted model 2, the odds ratios (95% confidence intervals) of depressive symptoms were 0.59 (0.44-0.79), 0.90 (0.69-1.19), 0.58 (0.45-0.76), and 0.64 (0.45-0.92) for the highest versus lowest quartile of total, cereal, vegetable, and fruit fiber intakes, respectively. Dose-response analyses found that the risk of depressive symptoms was associated with total fiber intake in a nonlinear manner, whereas the relationships were linear with cereal, vegetable, and fruit fiber intakes" - [Nutra USA]

The Protective Role of Astaxanthin for UV-Induced Skin Deterioration in Healthy People-A Randomized, Double-Blind, Placebo-Controlled Trial - Nutrients. 2018 Jun 25;10(7) - "Twenty-three healthy Japanese participants were recruited to a 10-week double-blind placebo-controlled study. They were assigned to the astaxanthin group supplemented with a capsule containing 4 mg of astaxanthin or the placebo group. To assess the protective role of astaxanthin for UV-induced skin deterioration, we determined the minimal erythema dose (MED) and analyzed UV-induced changes of moisture and transepidermal water loss (TEWL) at baseline and after 9 weeks of supplementation ... The astaxanthin group showed increased MED compared with placebo. In addition, the astaxanthin group had a reduced loss of skin moisture in the irradiated area compared with placebo. Subjective skin conditions for “improvement of rough skin” and “texture” in non-irradiated areas were significantly improved by astaxanthin. Astaxanthin seems protective against UV-induced skin deterioration and helps maintain healthy skin in healthy people" - [Nutra USA] - See astaxanthin at Amazon.com..

Neat Tech Stuff / "How 's":

I backordered the 65 inch before the tariffs kick in:

TCL 6 series (2018 Roku TV) review: Awesome picture for the price, and Roku TV seals the deal - CNET, 5/8/18 - "With superb picture quality that rivals TVs costing twice as much, TCL's 6 series is the best TV value we've ever reviewed."

Trump’s tariffs on China could hike the price of your next TV - Washington Post, 4/5/18 - "Last year, the average cost of a 55-inch TV in North America was $559, according to Paul Gagnon, an analyst with data firm IHS Markit. If the full cost of the tariffs is passed on to consumers, people looking to purchase a new TV would pay about $140 more"

Trump's trade war with China is underway - NYT, 7/5/18 - "The penalties, which went into effect at 12:01 a.m. [July 5th], prompted quick retaliation by Beijing"

Health Focus (Hair Loss):