New Study Reveals Exercise Could Keep Cells Decades Younger

A new study is showing that there may be additional benefits to exercise deep down at the cellular level.

Dr. Ulrich Laufs, from the University of Saarlandes in Saarbrücken, Germany has found that the cells of 50-year-old athletes appeared biologically younger (sometimes up to decades younger) than healthy people of the same age.

ABC News reports:

Laufs and his colleagues decided to tackle the problem by studying exercise’s chemical influence on telomeres — caps, that act as a sort of buffer at the end of chromosomes that protect DNA from damage. A young cell typically has long telomeres, but telomeres begin to degrade and fray as it ages. Older people typically have shorter telomeres in their cells. If telomeres in a cell are too short, the cell dies.

Laufs first did a series experiments with mice and showed the more the mice exercised, the more their body’s biochemistry protected their telomeres from deterioration. The mice also helped researchers pinpoint exactly how exercise rejuvenates cells in the cardiovascular system.

… The researchers then analyzed the blood chemistry of endurances athletes and non-active, but otherwise healthy people who were either in their 20s or 50s.

Human and mice endurance athletes of any age showed the same chemical signs that exercise was protecting their telomeres. But 50-year-old athletes had significantly longer telomeres than relatively healthy people their same age.

ABC News: “Exercise May Keep Your Cells Biologically Young”

image by Erica_Marshall