The Science Behind Audrey Hepburn’s Youthful Look
Audrey Hepburn was a film and fashion icon during the golden age of Hollywood. During the Dutch famine that followed the winter of 1944, food and fuel supplies were severely limited do to a German blockade. Hepburn, then a young girl, and many others resorted to making flour out of tulip bulbs to bake cakes and biscuits; she developed acute anemia, respiratory problems and edema as a result from malnutrition and suffered health problems throughout her life. Because of the excellent health-care infrastructure and record keeping in the Netherlands, epidemiologists have been able to follow the long term effects of the famine. This resulted in the emergence of modern epigenetics.
The truth is that 90% of the signs of aging and disease are caused by lifestyle, not genes.
Epigenetics is the study of non-DNA heredity. Epigenetics factors influence your aging even before you are born but also during your life. Epigenetics can delay aging by preventing deterioration of DNA molecules. You cannot change your genes, but you can change how your genes behave through epigenetics.
You can understand epigenetics like a movie script. For instance the book, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, there were two movies made, one a Swedish and the other an American. The movies were different but the book never changed. The book is like DNA, never changes, but the movies can change based on a different interpretation of the book.
You can influence how fast you will age by the healthy choices you make and the environmental factors surrounding you. One of my favorite examples is the two iconic stars of Hollywood’s golden age. Errol Flynn and Olivia de Havilland, who starred in eight films together during their careers. Errol lived to fifty years of age, he lived a very risqué life. He wrote a book about his life called My Wicked, Wicked Ways. Olivia passed away at 104 last year.
Epigenetics depends on DNA methylation which is the means by which DNA is repaired. As individuals age they lose the ability to repair DNA which leads to aging and the diseases of aging. Little tags are placed along the DNA gene by the process of methylation, a CH3 molecule which is called an epigenetic tag.
Basically this works like a light switch, when the DNA gene is tagged it stays off and when the tag is removed it turns on.
While several studies have found higher free radical levels induce abnormal loss of DNA methylation, one particular study is among the first to report that a change in diet can reverse this effect. Eating a diet rich in antioxidants and vitamins with folate and B12 can help sustain DNA methylation and help delay aging. Exercising causes changes to the pattern of epigenetic tags in muscle tissue. DNA methylation was found increased to 5000 times in a leg that was exercised vs. a non-exercised leg. Demonstrating the positive expression of exercise and methylation in reducing disease risk.
Can epigenetics help delay aging?
Yes, by preventing deterioration of DNA methylation. The cause of rapid aging is the global decrease in DNA methylation. The loss of DNA methylation is a common epigenetic event not only in cells as they age but also in cancer cells. It is known that epigenetic alterations lead to cancer, Alzheimer’s, cardiac, and metabolic diseases.
Scientific technology has developed tests for measuring DNA methylation. This represents one more potent testing procedure I use to design a unique and custom program to slow and occasional reverse the aging process and the advent of diseases of aging.
