longevity

The Devilishly Hard Question I’m Asked All the Time

Joe Schwarcz PhD — Fri, 16 May 2025 19:17:39 +0000

This article was first published in The Montreal Gazette.

Usually, the questioner has seen or heard something, often through social media, about a loathsome substance that is set to destroy their life or about one that promises to improve their health “naturally.” The answer to the question is almost always “no, it isn’t true, but ... The reason for the qualifier is that science isn’t white or black, it is best seen as several shades of gray.

Are Sex and Pickleball Keys to Longevity?

Joe Schwarcz PhD — Fri, 14 Feb 2025 22:44:36 +0000

This article was first published in The Montreal Gazette.

Want to lead a long life? Play pickleball and have sex. Who says so? Dan Buettner, a guy who knows something about longevity. After all, he is responsible for popularizing the concept of “blue zones,” regions of the world where people apparently have exceptionally long lives. And therein lies an interesting and somewhat controversial story.

Mitochondrial Dysfunction Is a Bit of a Fad

Jonathan Jarry M.Sc. — Fri, 14 Feb 2025 22:06:49 +0000

There is a shell game at the heart of Robert F. Kennedy Jr’s Make America Healthy Again campaign, and it has to do with the mitochondrion.

The Life and Death of a Soviet-Era Search for Longevity

Joe Schwarcz PhD — Fri, 20 Sep 2024 22:41:00 +0000

This article was first published in The Montreal Gazette.

Want to prolong life? To start with, you need three corpses from healthy young men accidentally killed in within the previous 12 hours.

Reservations About Resveratrol

Joe Schwarcz PhD — Thu, 14 Jan 2021 21:58:35 +0000

In 1940 Japanese researcher Michio Takaoka submitted his thesis for a graduate degree in which he described studies of plants with a folkloric history of having medicinal properties. Such studies involve the extraction, isolation and identification of compounds that may have biological activity. This is a complex and challenging project given that plants are veritable chemical factories, churning out hundreds of different substances.

The Right Chemistry: How To Live Longer

Joe Schwarcz PhD — Fri, 08 Nov 2019 20:04:59 +0000

Video of Dr. Joe Schwarcz: How to live longer

Eating Less and Living More

Joe Schwarcz PhD — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 22:30:23 +0000

They feast on croissants that ooze butter. They eat creamy cheeses and fat-filled pastries. Breakfast is pain-au-chocolat washed down with espresso. There is no oatmeal in sight. I suspect most of them have never heard of flaxseed. Yet, the French have the lowest death rate from heart disease in the European Union, and when we compare this rate to North America, well, there is no comparison. Our incidence of heart disease is double that of the French. Red wine consumption is the romanticized explanation that has been offered for this so-called “French paradox,” and there may indeed be something to that. Laboratory studies have shown that a compound in wine, called resveratrol, may reduce the risk associated with high cholesterol. But there is probably a better explanation as to why the French are protected. Read more