More telomerase tidbits

Posted on 1. March 2009 by Vince Giuliano

More telomerase tidbits

When I started following telomere/telomerase-related research 15 years ago, this was an arcane subject. Research publications related to it were extremely far-between and only a few far-out thinkers saw it as having a lot to do with human longevity. Nowadays, hardly a day goes by without new research related to telomeres or telomerase coming to my attention. Here are two tidbits.

– Leukocyte telomere length like HDL cholesterol is a predictor of susceptibility to coronary artery disease.

A study of 662 males and females followed over a a 29.8 year period, the Bogalusa Heart Study, showed that a) longer telomere length is positively correlated with higher levels of HDL cholesterol, b) shorter telomere length and lower levels of HDL: are highly correlated with increase in the risk for atherosclerosis and susceptibility to coronary artery disease, and c) shortening of longer telomeres is significantly reduced when higher levels of HDL is present. The simplest explanation is that low levels of HDL increase the level of oxidative risk and that cell reproduction is accelerated to replace cells damaged by oxidation and therefore average telomere lengths are higher when there is more HDL. I suspect there may be more to it than that. Namely, telomere lengths may also affect cholesterol levels. Another analysis of data from the Heart and Soul Study looked at patients with stable coronary artery disease. “ — patients in the lowest quartile of (leukocyte) telomere length remained at significantly increased risk of death compared to those in the highest quartile. Patients in the lowest quartile of telomere length were also at significantly increased risk of HF (Heart Failure) hospitalization –. This study suggests that leukocyte telomere length may be a predictor of mortality risk that provides information not included in the usual predictors such as cholesterol levels. These studies stop short of stating what to me seems obvious – that active intervention to maintain telomere lengths could possibly reduce the risk of susceptibility to coronary artery disease and the death rate of those that already have it.

– The longest living birds have very long telomeres and manage to keep them long. This was brought to my attention by reader of this blog Res and is covered in the discussion under the Naked Mole Rat item. Because of its importance I repeat the substance here. Res brought to my attention these citations relevant to the telomere lengths of different bird species and storm petrels in particular:
–
– http://mbe.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/msm244v1
http://www.bucknell.edu/x45446.xml
http://biblioteca.universia.net/ficha.do?id=22484361

My initial response to Res was: Extremely interesting articles. I get the following messages: 1. Since the storm petrels are tiny birds always on the go and live up to 40 years, this tends to knock out the theory that lifespan is centrally shaped by rate of metabolism. One explanation given for the long lifespan of the naked mole rat is that its existence is very laid back and it mostly sleeps. It is the opposite for the bird. 2. The accumulated oxidative damage theory of aging also does not seem very applicable for these birds since high metbolism generates a lot of free radicals. 3. The evidence connected with these and other birds is that long initial telomere lengths and telomere length maintenance are factors very correlated with longevity, e.g. a boost to the telomere shortening theory of aging. 4. Despite telomere lengths growing with age and low cancer rates these birds still die, suggesting that some other form of aging is operational and life-limiting for them.

About a week ago I updated the telomerase section in the Anti-Aging Firewalls treatise with a new perspective on the Telomere shortening theory of aging.

About Vince Giuliano

Being a follower, connoisseur, and interpreter of longevity research is my latest career, since 2007. I believe I am unique among the researchers and writers in the aging sciences community in one critical respect. That is, I personally practice the anti-aging interventions that I preach and that has kept me healthy, young, active and highly involved at my age, now 93. I am as productive as I was at age 45. I don’t know of anybody else active in that community in my age bracket. In particular, I have focused on the importance of controlling chronic inflammation for healthy aging, and have written a number of articles on that subject in this blog. In 2014, I created a dietary supplement to further this objective. In 2019, two family colleagues and I started up Synergy Bioherbals, a dietary supplement company that is now selling this product. In earlier reincarnations of my career. I was Founding Dean of a graduate school and a full University Professor at the State University of New York, a senior consultant working in a variety of fields at Arthur D. Little, Inc., Chief Scientist and C00 of Mirror Systems, a software company, and an international Internet consultant. I got off the ground with one of the earliest PhD's from Harvard in a field later to become known as computer science. Because there was no academic field of computer science at the time, to get through I had to qualify myself in hard sciences, so my studies focused heavily on quantum physics. In various ways I contributed to the Computer Revolution starting in the 1950s and the Internet Revolution starting in the late 1980s. I am now engaged in doing the same for The Longevity Revolution. I have published something like 200 books and papers as well as over 430 substantive.entries in this blog, and have enjoyed various periods of notoriety. If you do a Google search on Vincent E. Giuliano, most if not all of the entries on the first few pages that come up will be ones relating to me. I have a general writings site at www.vincegiuliano.com and an extensive site of my art at www.giulianoart.com. Please note that I have recently changed my mailbox to vegiuliano@agingsciences.com.
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4 Responses to More telomerase tidbits

  1. Res says:
    2. March 2009 at 19:09

    Vince
    Thanks for an interesting article reference. I have low hdl and high ldl. I was not taking any statins for the fear of side effects. My question is , do you think HDL increase would increase the telomere length. For example, they say crest*r increases HDL. Does that mean, it would increase telomere as well?

    Thanks for your thoughts

  2. admin says:
    2. March 2009 at 23:26

    Hi Res.
    I am afraid the research I cited does not answer your question. All that is known in fact is that there as an observed positive correlation between HDL and telomere length. Causal relationships are a matter of conjecture, such as the idea that high HDL leads to lower oxidative stress which leads to less leukocyte replication which leads to slower erosion of telomere lengths. This may not be the main or only mechanism involved, however. So personally I would not rush to conclude that taking statins will increase telomere lengths. Also, HDL is an intermediate indicator of suceptability to possible coronary artery disease. It could be the case as pointed out in one of the citations that leukocyte telomere length is as good or better an indicator

  3. Jayne says:
    8. October 2009 at 23:55

    Res
    Have you checked out William Davis’ website on HDL
    http://heartscanblog.blogspot.com/search/label/HDL
    (low HDL is an issue for me too). Niacin, iodine, fish oils exercise, no wheat, chocolate and red wine…
    He also talks about statins and when to use them (not very flattering though)

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