Study Indicates Quercetin Slows Aging

[Bill Quick]

Scripps Research, Mayo Clinic Scientists Find New Class of Drugs that Dramatically Increases Healthy Lifespan

Next, the team looked at how these drugs affected health and aging in mice.

“In animal models, the compounds improved cardiovascular function and exercise endurance, reduced osteoporosis and frailty, and extended healthspan,” said Niedernhofer, whose animal models of accelerated aging were used extensively in the study. “Remarkably, in some cases, these drugs did so with only a single course of treatment.”

In old mice, cardiovascular function was improved within five days of a single dose of the drugs. A single dose of a combination of the drugs led to improved exercise capacity in animals weakened by radiation therapy used for cancer. The effect lasted for at least seven months following treatment with the drugs. Periodic drug administration of mice with accelerated aging extended the healthspan in the animals, delaying age-related symptoms, spine degeneration and osteoporosis.

One of the two drugs tested was quercetin, a cheap, easily available nutrient. They gave it to the mice orally. On a per-weight basis, the dosage was about 25mg/lb, or about 5 grams for a two hundred pound person.

I've been taking it for several years now, in a much lower dosage, (250 mg/day) along with resveratrol with no ill effects I'm aware of. The paper indicates that they got their results with a single dose, that they saw massive improvements within seven days, and that those improvements lasted for at least seven months.

So I gobbled down 5 grams of quercetin last night. I'll keep reporting back on what happens - and whether I grow green tentacles in the middle of my forehead.

[SteveL]

Please keep us up to date.

[Suwannee Dave]

I will keep taking my barbell medicine

[Bill Quick]

I will keep taking my barbell medicine

Oh, me too, Dave. But I'm hoping this helps me with that, too.

[carson]

Someone told me that Testosterone would make a part of my life return to what I was at 18. I was a bit worried about that since I was stubbornly a virgin when I married at 20. Suspecting this person's advice was metaphorical I went ahead with a monthly regimen. I think it was a bit oversold. Back to the Quercetin. I wonder if one took large doses one would get younger.

[Bill Quick]

From the study:

“In animal models, the compounds improved cardiovascular function and exercise endurance, reduced osteoporosis and frailty, and extended healthspan,” said Niedernhofer, whose animal models of accelerated aging were used extensively in the study. “Remarkably, in some cases, these drugs did so with only a single course of treatment.”

From an earlier study: Extending healthy life by getting rid of retired cells

Baker tested out this system in a special strain of genetically engineered mice that age very quickly. It worked. The senescent cells disappeared, and that substantially delayed the onset of muscle loss, cataracts, and fat loss. Typically, around half of these mice show signs of muscle loss by five months of age. Without their senescent cells, only a quarter of them showed the same signs at ten months. Their muscle fibres were larger, and they ran further on treadmills. Even old mice, whose bodies had started to decline, showed improvements.

I think the idea isn't that you live longer, you just stay young(er) longer.

[Mr. Bingley]

Any proto-tentacles yet Bill?

[Mark E. Hurling]

So in the 5gm dosing protocol, is it one such dose a day? For how many days?

[Greg Esres]

Something like this comes along every few years, then quietly disappears. I was seduced by the mega-doses of anti-oxidants in the 80s and 90s, something we now know doesn't work and is actually associated with all sorts of bad health issues.

[Bill Quick]

From the article:

The combination of dasatinib and quercetin was effective in eliminating senescent MEFs. In vivo, this combination reduced senescent cell burden in chronologically aged, radiation-exposed, and progeroid Ercc1-/Δ mice. In old mice, cardiac function and carotid vascular reactivity were improved 5 days after a single dose. Following irradiation of one limb in mice, a single dose led to improved exercise capacity for at least 7 months following drug treatment. Periodic drug administration extended healthspan in Ercc1-/∆ mice, delaying age-related symptoms and pathology, osteoporosis and loss of intervertebral disc proteoglycans. These results demonstrate the feasibility of selectively ablating senescent cells and the efficacy of senolytics for alleviating symptoms of frailty and extending healthspan.

The "periodic drug administration" referred to once-weekly oral doses of quercetin at the 25mg/lb level. They didn't specify how long they continued with this (that I could find) however.