Another Engineered Calorie Restriction Method
It's been worms all the way down the past few days, and more worm engineering here via ScienceDaily: "worms live to an older age when they are unable to process the simple sugar glucose ... The findings may also cast some doubt on the prevailing treatments for type 2 diabetes, all of which are aimed at lowering blood levels of glucose by increasing the amount of sugar taken up by body tissues ... researchers exposed the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans to a chemical that blocked the worms' ability to process glucose, producing a metabolic state the researchers said resembles that of dietary glucose restriction. That treatment extended the worms' life span up to 20 percent ... Unable to depend on glucose for energy, the long-lived worms ramped up the activity of cellular powerhouses known as mitochondria to fuel their bodies ... That mitochondrial activity led to the increased production of reactive oxygen species, sometimes referred to as free radicals. In turn, the worms' defenses against 'oxidative stress' increased."
Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/10/071002131149.htm