8/13/2019 Red Wine Key to Longevity

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Red wine key to longevity?

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Sep 26, 2012 at 7:55 AM

Tags: Alcohol, Diabetes, High Blood Pressure, Honeybees, Longevity, Obesity, resveratrol, Wine

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A new study suggests that could red wine could decrease your appetite, facilitate weight loss and prevent

diabetes!

According to the findings published in the journal Aging, red wine could help you live longer. Resveratrol, a

compound found in red wine caused honeybees to decrease their food intake and live longer, while in mice it

prevented obesity and diabetes. Some research shows that resveratrol could be linked to a reduced risk of

inflammation and blood clotting.

A team of scientists from Arizona State University, the Norwegian University of Life Sciences and Harvard

Medical School conducted a series of experiments to test the effects of resveratrol on the lifespan, learning ability

and food perception in honeybees. Their research has confirmed that this compound extends the lifespan of

honey bees by 33 to 38 percent. The research also suggests that resveratrol changes the decisions that bees

make about food by triggering a moderation effect when they eat.

For the first time, we conducted several te sts on the effects of resveratrol by using the honey bee as a model.

We were able to confirm that under normal living conditions, resveratrol lengthened lifespan in honey bees, said

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8/13/2019 Red Wine Key to Longevity

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Brenda Rascon, an ASU alumnus and doctoral student with Gro Amdam, an ass ociate professor in ASUs School

of Life Sciences and the Norwegian University of Life Sciences.

Free radicals, often released during stressful conditions, are believed to cause damage to cells and have an

effect on how we age. Though resveratrol is an antioxidant, it did not, however, diminish the damaging effects of

free radicals. It did not prove to extend lives of bees l iving under stressful conditions. Yet, since the bees tested

with the compound were living longer, researchers wanted to know what caused them to live longer.

Because what we eat is such an important contributor to our physical health, we looked at the bees sensitivity to

sugar and their willingness to consume it. Bees typically gorge on sugar and while its the best thing for them, w e

know that eating too much is not necessarily a good thing, said Amdam. Interestingly, the research team

discovered that bees given the compound were less sensitive to sugar. The bees changed their perception about

food.

Finally, they measured how much food the bees would consume if given the opportunity to eat as much sugar

water as they possibly could. Surprisingly, the bees that received the drug decreased their food intake, said

Rascon. The bees were allowed to eat as much as they pleased and were certainly not starving they simply

would not gorge on the food that we know they like. Its possible that resveratrol may be working by some

mechanism that is related to caloric restriction a dietary regimen long known to extend lifespan in diverse

org anisms, he added.