Participants had an average chronological age of 58 years at the beginning of the study, and all but one had a younger biological age. Because of this, it’s unlikely that the reduction in biological age most participants experienced during the study was due to disease improvement. Instead, the improvement “might be attributed to underlying age mechanisms,” the authors—from Washington, Virginia, and Illinois universities—wrote.
They’re also reversible, as this study seemingly demonstrates.
As part of the study, participants were asked to consume the following foods daily:
Participants were also asked to make the following daily lifestyle adaptations:
None of the women completed all tasks all days, and that’s okay, researchers wrote. Improvements in biological age were seen among women who adhered to the program an average of 82% of the time. The relatively high level of adherence among patients was likely due in large part to the nutritional coaching provided, they added.
A seventh participant—a male—withdrew from the study due to a family emergency. Prior to the study, he had a chronological age of 71 and a biological age of 57.6. He had his biological age tested again at eight weeks, despite having withdrawn from the study, and it had increased to 61.6 years. Prior research has documented “sudden acceleration in biological age due to diverse stressful events,” though that aging is reversed when the stressor resolves, the authors noted.
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