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DISCOVER THE SECRETS OF YOUTH
The rate at which we age is ruled by a complex of variable factors over which, until recently, we thought we had little chance of exercising control. Now that science has taken the giant step of mapping the human genome, the genetic material that contains our genetic blueprint, we have the opportunity to understand and take steps to control our individual destinies.
Since 1990 we have accumulated more information on aging than was obtained over the previous 2000 years. What was once as arcane as alchemy has become molecular biology; what was considered magic is now quantum physics and genetics.
We have also begun to understand the critical impact of our environment―the air we breathe, the water we drink, what and how we eat, our internal flora and fauna, our psychological makeup, and the social surroundings in which we live and work―on our health and longevity, and more specifically, on our genes. Genetic damage, not the genes we inherited, dictates why most people around the world have a life span of sixty to seventy years. We do not need to assume that illness is inevitable as we grow older or accept damage to our genes as unavoidable. We now have the means to control and retard the process of our own aging.
 In June 2000, researchers from the United States and Britain announced that they had deciphered the human genome, the sequence of chemical "letters" containing the basic instructions for building and running the human body. This 3-billion-letter code contains the genetic makeup of all human beings. To the surprise of those who mapped the human genome, what was originally thought to be a collection of about 100,000 genes turned out to be approximately 30,000, only a few thousand (perhaps 10 percent) of which are active at any time during our lives. We now know that the set of active genes changes as we grow, mature, and age. We used to think that each gene bore the code for a single purpose, but it now has become evident that each may play multiple roles.
Our bodies are made up of some 100 trillion cells, differentiated according to the work they perform. The single most important breakthrough that led to the mapping of the human genome was the discovery of DNA in the nucleus of each of these cells. Even though 99.9 percent of the DNA found in the human body is identical from person to person, DNA also contains the genetic code that makes each of us unique. It is that remaining 0.1 percent that makes us different.
Environmental factors can cause stress and damage to DNA, changing the way genes function within our bodies. Hostile environments can give rise to malfunctioning genes and, ultimately, cause aging, disease, and death. If DNA carries our genetic code, then a subset of DNA carries the code that determines how we age, and it can be negatively affected by life style and environmental factors. Breaking this code and learning to understand and manage it needs to be important to us.
Science is already beginning to use our rudimentary understanding of the genetic code to perform gene therapy to treat a limited number of diseases. Eventually, although perhaps not for several decades, we will be able to use information about specific genes to intercede in the aging process. But we know enough about the aging code now to make a difference in how we age, to improve our health and increase longevity.
 Being part of an integrative health care system offers a model that you can incorporate into your lifestyle to achieve a longer life than would otherwise be possible, as well as a better quality of life as you age. The premise is the radical concept that we are built for self-repair, and are not programmed to die. Contrary to conventional wisdom, which holds that we die once our cells have divided and reproduced themselves a set number of times, information now seems to indicate that the capacity for cell division is not as restricted as we thought. This means that we have the potential to live longer, healthier lives, under the right circumstances and in the right environment.
Central to this new paradigm of aging is the belief that we can limit damage to DNA and repair what harm is done, allowing us to maximize our genetic potential. To do this requires that we control the four main cellular processes―glycation, inflammation, oxidation, and methylation that take place within each cell and influence ageing―related changes that every body undergoes. Taken together, these processes can be viewed as an equation we can use to break the "aging code" stored in our genes. Success with this endeavor will forestall the diseases we associate with aging and slow the changes to our appearance that occur with the passage of time.
Developing an anti-aging regimen has obvious benefits for us individually, but it also will benefit our economy and society as a whole. By 1995, the most recent year for which such data are available, members of the baby boom generation (the 77 million people born between 1947 and 1964) had collectively saved 15 trillion dollars for their retirement (some of which surely disappeared during the recession that began in 2001). But if current disease patterns of aging continue unabated, this generation will require 184 trillion dollars to maintain their health as they age. There is not that much money on the entire planet.
Experts anticipated that 14 percent of the United States budget would be spent on geriatric medicine starting in 2003. If the health span―that is, maintaining oneself in a healthy, productive condition―of every American could be extended by only one year, the United States economy would save 1 trillion to 3 trillion dollars in healthcare costs and lost productivity. If prevailing disease patterns continue through the next twenty years, the healthcare system of the United States will become bankrupt. Current medical anti-aging technology can provide a healthy life expectancy of 90 to 100 years to at least half of today's 76 million baby boomers.
In summary, our age-management goals are to control the negative effects of the twenty-first century environment we live in; to manage the processes that lead to aging; and to boost the ratio of DNA repair to DNA damage, resulting in less cell mutation and more accurate cell copies during cell replication. Our intention is to assist you in the accomplishment of this task. You may need professional help for some of it, but you can do most of it yourself.
EXERCISE AND THE BRAIN
Exercise activates molecular and cellular cascades that:
- Activates mechanisms that protect the brain from damage
- Increases overall body status to brain function
- Increases the level of hippocampal BDNF
- Induces expression of genes encoding (Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor) BDNF
- Positively affects the hippocampus, a brain region central to learning and memory
- Promotes brain vascularization, neurogenesis (creation of new neurons), functional changes in neuronal structure and neuronal resistance to injury
- Strengthens neuronal structure and facilitates synaptic transmission
Support and maintain brain plasticity
DIET AND DESCENDANTS
Perhaps the most baffling observation about our parents’ IGF2 genes is that they have identical DNA sequences, despite one being switched off. Closer inspection has revealed that there are subtle differences beyond the DNA sequences of silent and active genes. They differ in the way that nearby DNA is methylated. This affects which proteins can bind to the DNA and activate genes. Mum’s IGF2 gene (not methylated) is silenced by a repressor protein that binds to DNA. Dad’s chromosome is methylated near the IGF2 gene, which stops the repressor from binding and turning off Dad’s copy. Methyl is a very simple molecule involved in many biological processes. Adrian Bird (University of Edinburgh, UK) and other scientists recognize the importance of this tiny collection of atoms in silencing DNA.
However, silent genes are not a simple matter. There are a variety of means by which the volume knobs of our DNA might be twiddled. Considerable cross-talk occurs between three main players in silencing: DNA methylation, nucleosomes and RNA. These epigenetic features facilitate a dialogue between the environment and our genetic hard-wiring. The extent to which epigenetic features are heritable is not yet clear, but we are getting a clearer picture of how they are set up. Taking DNA methylation as an example, such décor can result from what your mother ate when she was pregnant. Experiments with agouti mice have shown that feeding methyl-supplements to pregnant mothers can affect the volume settings of genes in their offspring.
The demonstration that nutrients can directly affect DNA is relatively recent news. Although we don’t yet know how much our environment shapes gene silencing, there is increasing evidence to show that messing up DNA methylation during development can cause a range of health problems from cancer to schizophrenia. Without doubt, the greatest implication of such heritable epigenetic features is the influence your diet might have on the genes of your children and grandchildren.
THE FINAL STEP IN BREAKING THE AGING CODE
It is necessary to emphasized the importance of repairing and maintaining our DNA in an optimal state, understanding the new technologies designed to add both extended quality and years to our lives, and the use of supplements, nutraceuticals, and nutritional and lifestyle changes that will help you to better use the genes you have inherited. There is something unique about the DNA in every one of the 100 trillion cells that make up your body. To explore this uniqueness, we look at discoveries in other scientific disciplines.
The field of quantum physics proposes that all matter is composed of energy that is constantly vibrating at different frequencies. What we see as solid is really composed of subatomic particles in constant motion. Nothing holds still: not the chair on which you sit, not the book you hold in your hands, not the bones in your hands, not even your DNA.
Underlying all of this motion is a ubiquitous force that quantum physics has called Zero Point Energy (ZPE)―energy undetectable by our human senses but present in every square centimeter of air and space. Not only has ZPE been mathematically proven to exist, it has been measured with the latest array of scientific instrumentation. As hard as this is to believe (the idea that your automobile is in motion even when it is parked defies common sense), we cannot reject what science has shown to be true. Yet we hunger for some experiential proof of this transcending, limitless energy, something we can see or feel that provides concrete evidence it exists and makes up all matter.
Perhaps we can find evidence of ZPE's existence in another natural phenomenon, an aspect of nature known as Phi. Also referred to as the Divine Proportion and the Golden Proportion, Phi is a mathematical constant found everywhere in nature. The value of Phi is 1.618 . . . (the dots indicate that the decimal number extends to infinity). (Phi is not to be confused with Pi, or 3.1416 , the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter.) It is a number that exists everywhere in nature. Phi's ubiquity is beyond mere chance. It can be found in the spirals of the galaxies, the spiral of a chambered nautilus seashell, in the growth patterns of flowers and plants, in the behavior of light and atoms, even in the form of the pentagram (a five-pointed star). Phi is the ratio of the measurement from the tip of any of the Grand Pyramids to the ground, assuming a plumb line could be dropped from inside the pyramid, and from that point to the edge of the structure. Phi defines the dimensions of the Parthenon in Athens. Phi is used in musical composition, and it is found in the human body.
Measure the distance from the tip of your head to the floor, then divide this number by the distance from the floor to your navel, and you get Phi. Measure the distance from your shoulder to the tip of your middle finger, and divide the result by the distance from your elbow to your fingertip. Once again, it's 1.618. Hip to floor divided by knee to floor. Finger joints, toes, spinal divisions, even to the length and width of the DNA molecule itself, all illustrate the ratio of Phi.
Phi is a magical number. We recognize it as evidence of proper proportion even when we are unaware of its existence. But Phi is more than that―it is physical evidence of an underlying energy force. Phi is the hidden order within the chaos we see in our twenty-first century world. When the ancients discovered the Divine Proportion, Phi, they were certain they were observing God's energy flow into the world, giving it the form and substance we know as matter. They saw Phi as the energy blueprint on which all matter is based. Although the existence of this underlying force has been intuited since ancient times, science has measured and scientifically proven its existence only recently.
This hypothesis―that human DNA acts as a conduit for this all-pervasive energy field―is backed by scientific evidence from many unrelated disciplines. Simply put, DNA acts as the bridge between the world of matter and the world of energy'; it controls the flow of ZPE. This control appears to be based on DNA'S three-dimensional shape and structural integrity. DNA's relationship to Phi is compromised and its ability to channel ZPE decreased only if DNA has suffered damage beyond the body's ability to repair it.
Furthermore, recent research has shown that DNA is affected by energy fields generated by the human body itself, as with the electromagnetic fields of the heart and brain. It also appears that emotions themselves may generate energy that alters these electromagnetic fields, affecting the shape of DNA and its ability to transmit its force from the world ~f energy to the world of matter.
Research at Stanford University has shown that positive emotions (love and compassion) and negative emotions (hate and anger) have opposite effects on the three-dimensional configuration of the DNA molecule. Most significantly, the positive emotions actually create electromagnetic fields that enhance DNA's three-dimensional shape, molding it back toward its ideal state so the flow of ZPE is increased.
Further support for the theory that DNA is a conduit for zero point energy comes from additional information from the discipline of quantum physics. Physicists in the field stunned the world when they suggested that black holes are a source of enormous energy emissions, as opposed to sucking in everything within range and emitting nothing. It was even suggested that black holes might actually form a bridge between parallel universes of energy and matter. Following the ancient adage "As above, so below" (what happens in the micro world of invisible energy happens in the macro world of visible matter), I propose that DNA may be analogous to an extremely small black hole, from which zero point energy finds its way to the physical world through the double helices of DNA's structure.
Support for this notion comes from the fact that it has been proven that DNA acts as a superconductor, transporting electrons down the length of its double helix.
It has also been shown that DNA emits energy in the form of biophotons, which have been measured and scientifically documented. It has been further postulated that DNA's base pairs, and their specific positions and shapes, may act as antennae for specific electromagnetic frequencies, which may determine what proteins or enzymes are produced. These emitted biophotons may actually be the energetic blueprint that directs the physical machinery of DNA to accomplish its specific tasks.
In summary, not only does DNA affect the flow of this universal, ubiquitous, infinite energy source called ZPE, but DNA is also influenced by the electromagnetic energy emitted by the human body itself. As we daily experience the gambit of human emotions, this does not seem so far-fetched. Evidence for the influence of human beings' electromagnetic fields is found in scientific studies showing that energy emitted by human hands can directly affect wound healing, tissue growth, and protein formation.
Perhaps it is no coincidence that throughout recorded history every great religion has emphasized the same message of love: love for God, love for oneself, and love for one's fellow human beings. Love may well be the emotion that gives rise to the energy that restructures and activates DNA and directs the flow of infinite energy into each one of our 100 trillion cells. Perhaps we are just now beginning to understand the basis of body-emotions-mind-spirit interactions, "miraculous" cures, and "spontaneous" remissions. It may also be that the secret to optimal aging and optimal health has always been encoded within us. It appears that the knowledge given to us by the multitude of scientific and medical disciplines now gives us the means to consciously affect our genetic machinery, our DNA, and make quantum energetic improvements to our health and our longevity.
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