Key points from article :
Researchers from the Buck Institute demonstrated a link between diet, circadian rhythms, eye health and lifespan in Drosophila.
Professor Pankaj Kapahi said: “We are now showing that not only does fasting improve eyesight, but the eye actually plays a role in influencing lifespan.”
Connection lies in circadian “clocks,” 24-hour oscillations - affects complex animal behaviors.
Lead author Brian Hodge said: “The fruit fly has such a short lifespan, making it a really beautiful model that allows us to screen a lot of things at once.”
He noticed numerous genes both diet-responsive and exhibiting ups and downs at different time points, or “rhythmic.”
They then used bioinformatics to ask: Do these genes influence lifespan? The answer was yes they do.
Kapahi said: “Staring at computer and phone screens, [] well into the night are conditions very disturbing for circadian clocks."
Hodge noted understanding how these processes work can help to target the molecular clock to decelerate aging.
Research by Buck Institute led by Prof. Pankaj Kapahi published in Nature Communications.
