2023-06-08 17:51:45
Growing as old as possible with a youthful appearance, who wouldn’t want that? Healthy food, enough exercise and a skincare routine that you say to. Yes, these things help you to stay looking young, but unfortunately not everything can be fixed with a cream and smoothie bowls. How quickly or slowly you age is partly determined from the moment you are born. In the University of Flanders podcast molecular epidemiologist Dries Martens explains this. Do you want to know why one person ages faster than the other? Then read on quickly!
Aging beautifully? That’s how you do that
Just because you were born on the same date doesn’t mean you’re biologically the same age. That immediately explains why some people still look fresh and young at the age of sixty, while for others their age is betrayed by wrinkles. How fast you grow old has to do with your lifestyle. When you have a healthy lifestyle, you often also have a biologically younger age. But there is also another factor that determines your biological age.
Everything you need to learn about your telomeres
There is something very small in our body that causes you to age faster or slower; your telomeres. What Are Telomeres? Time for a little refresher course in biology. There are chromosomes in your body. These chromosomes are strands of DNA. At the end of your chromosomes are a kind of protective caps. These caps are called telomeres.
What your telomeres and your sneakers have in common
It may sound a bit crazy, but you can compare the telomeres to shoelaces. Shoelaces also have a protective cap at the end that ensures that your laces do not fray. Dries: ‘That also happens with our chromosomes. Telomeres are at the ends of our chromosomes. As we age or cells start to divide, these telomeres shorten.’
How long are your telomeres?
When you are born, your telomeres are at their longest, but each time our cells divide or renew, they get a little shorter. Dries: ‘That’s not a problem because there is no genetic information in your telomeres. But after a while the telomeres become so short that our chromosomes can be damaged and the cells stop dividing.’ A cell can no longer renew itself and eventually dies. This gives you wrinkles and increases your risk of age-related diseases.
Your telomeres get shorter as you get older. You can slow down this process by living as healthy as possible. So your health deserves at least as much attention as your favorite sneaker! Yet the length of your telomeres is not only determined by your lifestyle. Some people are born with longer telomeres than others.
The influence of pregnancy on your telomere length
This has to do with the genes you inherit, but also with your mother’s environment during pregnancy.’ We can show that mothers who are overweight during pregnancy have children whose telomeres are shorter at birth. In addition, exposure to air pollution during pregnancy determines telomere length at birth.’
You can do this to slow down aging
You may not have any influence on the telomere length you are born with, but you can influence how you live afterwards. Eat healthy, exercise enough, avoid cigarettes and avoid stress. So it’s time to knock the fabric off your yoga mat and go into zen mode. working overtime? You really don’t do that anymore, you save from now on for telomeres that are even longer than all your working days together!
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