HCHY List: Medical research - hanging out with younger people good for your health

[Derek Peterson]

Here is an article on WHY baby boomers might want to connect to younger
people. I think Ayn Rand called it "enlightened self interest." ;-)

Onward,
Derek

Live longer, hang out with young people

By Roger Highfield, Science Editor
Last Updated: 3:01pm BST 02/06/2008

Hanging out with younger, healthier people might help the elderly to live
longer, suggests a study of fruit flies.

The research also supports the notion that old people are more likely to
thrive if with a younger peer group, or with their children and
grandchildren, than if they are with their aged peers in a home.

Scientists have already gathered a range of evidence that having a social
network is healthier than leading a solitary life: the healthy effects of
attending church could be as significant as those enjoyed by people who give
up smoking, according to one study of 4,000 elderly people in North
Carolina.

Another study at the University of Chicago found that loneliness is a major
risk factor in increasing blood pressure and could raise the risk of death
from stroke and heart disease.

However, the underlying reason why being sociable has health effects have
not been well understood. Now, fruit flies are set to provide the answer,
after the discovery that fast-ageing flies that socialise with normal flies
live longer than if they live with their peers.

In a study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences,
Drs Hongyu Ruan and Prof Chun-Fang Wu of the University of Iowa used the
fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster to examine the molecular networks that
govern the effects of social interactions on the ageing process.

The authors grew a particular strain of mutant fly with greatly reduced
lifespan and raised the flies in the same vial as normal fruit flies.

What was striking was that the mutant flies that lived with normal flies
lived survived nearly twice as long as mutants housed with other mutants.

In addition, flies with shorter lifespans housed with the normal flies had
improved physical responses and better survived environmental stresses
compared to those that remained among the mutant population, according to
the authors.

The mutation that cuts lifespan, by interfering with an enzyme that mops up
harmful radicals, mirrors deficits in a number of age-dependent diseases in
humans, including Parkinson's, Huntington's, and Alzheimer's diseases,
leading the team to suggest that their research may aid in therapies for
these illnesses.

"Our results provide a definitive case of beneficial social interaction on
lifespan and a useful entry point for analysing the underlying molecular
networks and physiological mechanisms," they conclude.