The Telomere Effect by Elizabeth Blackburn and Elissa Epel
A Revolutionary Approach to Living Younger, Healthier, Longer
I had a few dollars left on a Dymocks book voucher and do you need a better reason to get on the train, travel to Melbourne CBD and make your way to their Collins Street flagship bookshop.
I've read quite a few of the more recent books on genetics (see https://timsbestreads.blogspot.com/p/junk-dna-by-nessa-carey-i-was-given-50.html) so already knew about telomeres and the part they play in our ageing. But I was attracted by a book that promised to zoom in on these intriguing items and what we can learn from them.
The article https://www.theguardian.com/science/2017/jan/29/telomere-effect-elizabeth-blackburn-nobel-prize-medicine-chromosomes by Nobel Prize laureate Elizabeth Blackburn (and she's from Tasmania!) is very interesting but the first few questions in particular explain the premise of the book.
You won your Nobel prize for medicine for your discoveries concerning telomeres, found at the ends of chromosomes. What are telomeres and what happens to them as we age?
If you think of your chromosomes – which carry your genetic material – as shoelaces, telomeres are the little protective tips at the end. They are made of repeating short sequences of DNA sheathed in special proteins.
During our lives they tend to wear down and when telomeres can’t protect chromosomes properly, cells can’t replenish and they malfunction. This sets up physiological changes in the body which increase risks of the major conditions and diseases of ageing: cardiovascular disease, diabetes, cancer, a weakened immune system and more. But the process is somewhat malleable. It is happening in all of us at some rate, but the rate can change. An enzyme called telomerase can add DNA to the ends of chromosomes to slow, prevent and partially reverse the shortening.
Can you delay or reverse ageing by taking care of your telomeres?
We all have health spans – the number of years we remain healthy, active and disease-free – and the shortening of our telomeres contributes to ageing and our entry from health span into disease span. But we can [do things that] affect our telomerase and telomeres, that can [delay] entry from health span to disease span. So we are talking more about keeping people healthier for longer and staving off some diseases of ageing. This is not about extreme life span extension – though of course staying healthier longer does have a reflection in mortality rates.
In the book you argue that to lengthen our telomeres, or at least stop them shortening, we need to improve our lifestyle by managing chronic stress, exercising, eating better and getting enough sleep. A lot of these things are recommended already – so what is new?
People hadn’t understood why at the cellular level the sorts of things that are recommended to improve lifestyle can help stave off disease. One reason is because they are helping you maintain telomeres. The book integrates a lot of new studies – from genetics, epidemiology and social science – that have been accumulating. We also provide a new biological underpinning to the mind-body connection. Nobody had any idea that meditation and the like, which people can use to reduce stress and increase wellbeing, would be having their salutary and well-documented useful effects in part through telomeres. The book is also recognising how much control we can have. Small tweaks in how you approach stress, for example, can lead to long-term habits that make a difference.
Also check out her TED address: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wseM6wWd74
Well the bad news is that you still going to age and eventually die, even if you do everything this book recommends. But if you want to control how quickly you age and how long you maintain your health into old age, then the ideas in this book are for you.
The book is not only a scientific explanation of telomere research, it's also a self help book that offers practical and realistic ways to slow aging. So it's also a lifestyle book, but one that is easy to read and which motivates you to life a healthier life.
Having read the book, now I need to skim it a second time and extract the lifestyle related strategies that can help me in my own ageing process.
