The nutrient that fights the premature aging caused by cancer
Summary
In her words, she felt “old.” Every year, men and women just like her survive cancer only to be left with long-term side-effects from the treatment that saved their lives. This got scientists at the UCLA Cousins Center for Psychoneuroimmunology and the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior wondering whether this accelerated aging was behind the cognitive problems so many cancer survivors experience. The indicators of biological aging they were looking for included elevated levels of DNA damage, reduced telomerase enzymatic activity and shorter telomere length in certain blood cells. To sum it up, cancer treatment had aged the women beyond their years, leaving them less able to care for themselves, unfocused and slow. According to Mark Houston M.D., Associate Clinical Professor of Medicine at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, Director of the Hypertension Institute and Vascular Biology, and the Director of the Life Extension Institute and Human Nutrition, at Saint Thomas Medical Group and Saint Thomas Hospital in Nashville, Tennessee, “Resveratrol shows the most promise as an anti-aging nutrient.” If you haven’t heard of it before, resveratrol is a polyphenol (a compound that gives fruits and veggies their bright colors) found in the skin of red grapes.