Antonio Zamora, a lean 64-year-old computer scientist from Bethesda, suffers none of the chronic diseases that afflict people his age. "I haven't been sick for a long time," Zamora said. "Last year, my medical bill came to $20 - for my co-pay for my yearly medical exam."
His secret: a variant of an ultra-low-calorie diet known to extend the lives of animals and protect humans from age-related diseases.
Known as calorie restriction, or CR, the Spartan diet is one of several avenues researchers are exploring in their quest to understand and delay aging. They're also interested in genes that appear to play a role in getting older, along with a variety of chemical compounds, including one found in red wine, that may possess life-extending properties.
But assembling the clues to solve the aging puzzle is no easy feat.
"We know a lot more than when Ponce de Leon was wandering around Florida looking for the Fountain of Youth," said Cynthia Wolberger, a Johns Hopkins University professor of biophysics. "But these things are tied together in ways that aren't completely understood."
Even so, paragons of self-control such as Zamora are forging ahead, as are scientists intent on developing anti-aging therapies.
Last week, Harvard University researchers announced a link between aging and two human genes that seem to play a role in the longevity of the cells that compose our bodies. Scientists said the discovery might help explain the health benefits of caloric restriction, which can extend the life of a number of organisms - including rats and primates - by up to 30 percent.
"We've found a gatekeeper of cell survival and potentially the aging process itself," said David Sinclair, a Harvard molecular geneticist and lead author of the paper.
Outside experts praised the study, published in the journal Cell, as an important, scientifically rigorous step in understanding why cells die. But they cautioned that the link to human aging was speculative.
"It's certainly very good, solid science, and it's obviously fascinating," said David Finkelstein, a molecular biologist and program administrator at the National Institute on Aging in Bethesda. "But to extrapolate from that to human aging is a big step."
This is the latest in a string of high-profile discoveries Sinclair has made in his efforts to understand cellular mechanisms of aging and develop drugs to foil them. In 2003, he made headlines after finding that resveratrol, a compound in red wine, could lengthen the life span of yeast cells by up to 80 percent. The compound has since been shown to also extend the lives of worms and flies.
