Elixir of youth

The keys to good health well into old age are in our hands, says a youthful scientist who advocates diet and exercise and a little of what’s bad” for us.

- Jo BENNETT

On the hottest day of September in 1991, eight adult volunteers sealed themselves into a three-acre geodesic glasshouse in the red earth of Oracle, Arizona. The four men and four women, self-confessed hippies, had day jobs in experimental theatre, farming and furniture-making, but their shared mission was to create an exact ecological replica of the Earth, complete with forests, deserts and even a living coral reef. It was called Biosphere 2.

Several strange things happened in the two years they spent locked inside this sci-ficomplex – oxygen deprivation, warfare between two groups, and a desperate lack of food – but there was something else going on in the rainforest biome. Free of pesticides and wind, trees grew quickly and lusciously. Yet, despite their near-perfect conditions, once mature, they toppled over and died.

The problem wasn’t overwatering or a virus. It was stress, or more specifically a lack of it. Without wind, the trees were unable to grow “stress wood”, an important part of the ageing process that hardens the tree trunk and supports its full size.

In his bestselling book In his bestselling book Jellyfish Age Backwards: Nature’s secrets to longevity, Nicklas Brendborg, 27, a rising star in molecular biology with an MA in biotechnology from the University of Copenhagen, says stress is one of the keys to living a long and healthy life. This is not the stress of working long hours and being busy: it’s the specific tension we place on our cells when we give them small doses of toxins or “survivable stressors”. Cells in recovery are better at repair and maintenance, reduce bodily inflammation, and improve blood sugar regulation.