Anti-aging study boosts worm lifespans with high sugar diet after reproductive age

Amazing stuff! A high sugar diet for longer life? Very fascinating research!

"New research on aging in roundworms has thrown up some intriguing results, with scientists ... finding they could increase the animals' lifespan by feeding them a high-sugar diet. ...

The study zeroed in on a stress response that takes place when there is an accumulation of unfolded proteins inside a cell. This could be caused by an excess of glucose or through natural aging, as our cellular machinery responsible for generating healthy proteins deteriorates. Known as the unfolded protein response, the mechanism monitors these things with stress sensors, and kicks into action as needed, clearing away the unfolded proteins to maintain balance in the cell.

... roundworm C. elegans ...
A group of worms were fed a high-glucose diet at a post-reproductive age (at day five when they were no longer fertile), while a group of young worms at the start of adulthood (one day old), were fed the same diet. The older worms lived almost twice as long, seeing out 24 days, while the younger worms lived for just 13. A control group of worms on a normal diet lived for 20 days. Compared to these control animals, the aged worms on a high-fat diet were more agile and featured more energy storage cells, which the researchers say is indicative of healthier aging. ...

Called IRE1, the scientists then removed the gene coding for this stress sensor, in effect switching off the cellular pathway for the stress response.

Interestingly, this led the young worms to live for an impressive 25 days, despite their high-sugar diet, almost twice as long as the young worms with the IRE1 stress sensor in place. This indicates that the perpetual activation of the stress response throughout the worms’ lives was effectively shortening their lifespan. ...
“We believe that the high-glucose diet fed to the aged worms stimulated their otherwise sluggish unfolded protein response and switched on certain cellular pathways, tackling not just the stress caused by excess glucose but also other aging-related stress, restoring cellular stability,” ..."

From the abstract:

"Metabolic diseases often share common traits, including accumulation of unfolded proteins in the endoplasmic reticulum (ER). Upon ER stress, the unfolded protein response (UPR) is activated to limit cellular damage which weakens with age. Here, we show that Caenorhabditis elegans fed a bacterial diet supplemented high glucose at day 5 of adulthood (HGD-5) extends their lifespan, whereas exposed at day 1 (HGD-1) experience shortened longevity. We observed a metabolic shift only in HGD-1, while glucose and infertility synergistically prolonged the lifespan of HGD-5, independently of DAF-16. Notably, we identified that UPR stress sensors ATF-6 and PEK-1 contributed to the longevity of HGD-5 worms, while ire-1 ablation drastically increased HGD-1 lifespan. Together, we postulate that HGD activates the otherwise quiescent UPR in aged worms to overcome ageing-related stress and restore ER homeostasis. In contrast, young animals subjected to HGD provokes unresolved ER stress, conversely leading to a detrimental stress response."

Anti-aging study boosts worm lifespans with glucose: New research on aging in roundworms has thrown up some intriguing results, with scientists at Nanyang Technological University (NTU), Singapore finding they could increase the animals lifespan by feeding them a high-sugar diet.

The unfolded protein response reverses the effects of glucose on lifespan in chemically-sterilized C. elegans (open access)

Fig. 4: Glucose and infertility synergistically drive the lifespan of aged animals.