Calorie restriction theory - disproved!

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I knew there must have been something dodgy about Calorie Restriction theory!  It turns out they badly messed up the original  2009 Wisconsin study by overloading monkeys with sugar!  Not surprizingly - the less of that feed the monkeys ate the better they did!  Gross incompetence! Too bad for those who believed in that theory! Too late for Dr. Roy Walford and probably for many many others like him!

Rhesus macaque (wiki)

In contrast to that, the new just published study in "Nature" used a healthier diet over 25 years. The result was that the calorie restricted monkeys had more disease, by about 40% more (see the graph below)  than the control group!

Calorie restriction falters in the long run.
Genetics and healthy diets matter more for longevity.

Quotes [green comments inserted by me]:

The verdict, from a 25-year study [NIA study] in rhesus monkeys fed 30% less than control animals, represents another setback for the notion that a simple, diet-triggered switch can slow ageing. Instead, the findings, published this week in Nature[1], suggest that genetics and dietary composition matter more for longevity than a simple calorie count.
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One reason for that difference could be that the WNPRC [an older study that supposedly  "proved" less calories = live longer] monkeys were fed an unhealthy diet, which made the calorie-restricted monkeys seem healthier by comparison simply because they ate less of it. The WNPRC monkeys’ diets contained 28.5% sucrose, compared with 3.9% sucrose at the NIA. Meanwhile, the NIA meals included fish oil and antioxidants, whereas the WNPRC meals did not. Rick Weindruch, a gerontologist at the WNPRC who led the study, admits: "Overall, our diet was probably not as healthy."
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Observational studies have found that people of average weight tend to live longest[3]. Nir Barzilai, a gerontologist at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York, says that the centenarians he studies have led him to believe that genetics is more important than diet and lifestyle. "They’re a chubby bunch," he says.

Fig 3. Incidence and estimated proportions of three major age-related diseases.
 Red=Caloric Restriction Group [more disease], Blue=Control Group[less disease]

Another article:

Severe Diet Doesn’t Prolong Life, at Least in Monkeys, by Gina Kolata

I can't believe its not butter!

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Major health scandal involving butter-flavored "food" and food industry. Lawyers and all that...

Search "diacetyl toxicity"

Notice links to fatal lung disease among factory workers handling butter flavor stuff, and also reports of neurological Alzheimer's like symptoms:

Article: "Butter Popcorn Chemical Linked To Alzheimer’s"

Not much news in the mainstream press. Why people ever buy that corporate crap at all? Why not just use real butter?

Glucose and epileptic seizures

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Interesting paper, requires more discussion (to be added later):


Fructose-1,6-Bisphosphate Has Anticonvulsant Activity in Models of Acute Seizures in Adult Rats

A variety of observations suggest that decreasing glycolysis and increasing levels of reduced glutathione, generated by metabolism of glucose through the pentose phosphate pathway, would have an anticonvulsant effect. 

Glucose is the primary source of energy for the CNS. Imaging of children with Lennox–Gastaut and infantile spasms has shown decreased glucose utilization between seizures and excessive glycolysis immediately before, and during, seizures (Chugani and Chugani, 1999). 

Evidence suggests that the changes in glucose metabolism and decreased glutathione levels observed in the brains of patients with epilepsy favor the generation of each seizure. First, hyperglycemia has been associated with seizure activity (Schwechter et al., 2003; Lammouchi et al., 2004), whereas relative hypoglycemia has been shown to have an anticonvulsant effect (Greene et al., 2001). Second, the ketogenic diet (KD), which provides energy substrates for the brain that bypass glycolysis, has been shown to be an effective treatment for seizures (Freeman et al., 2007). Finally, animals with low levels of GSH have a low seizure threshold or spontaneous seizures (Wu et al., 2004).

[add discussion]