Antioxidants, vitamins no antidotes for aging

London, December 1: While cosmetics, medicines and anti-aging foods are progressing tremendously in the fight against aging, researchers claim they are all in vain.

Exposing the vitality of antioxidantsdefine, the key ingredient in the much touted anti-aging products, experts say there was "no clear evidence" they could slow aging.

While the anti-aging theory, observed since the 1950s, suggests a clear antioxidant link that mops up the molecular damage caused by reactive forms of oxygen called free radicals, thus minimizing their damage, the new study embarked at the University College London, however, reveals that ‘molecular mechanism proposed to explain how they (antioxidants) work is mistaken’.

To check up whether antioxidants actually help in the fight aging, the researchers genetically engineered nematode worms.

The small Nematode worm, while distinct from the human species in many respects, share several crucial aging genesdefine.

The researchers genetically tapered its genes to nurture a naturally active defense system free from free radicals. The mechanism, however, did not affect the worm’s lifespan.

"You can drastically change the natural defense levels and there's just no effect on David ageing" David Gems, study’s lead author and researcher at University College London noted.

While according to the aging theory the worms were more likely to die sooner, these worms lived just as long as the others, thus discounting the widely held free-radical theory.

Putting up the facts together, Gems said, "The fact is that we don't understand much about the fundamental mechanisms of aging - the free radical theory has filled a knowledge vacuum for over 50 years now, but it doesn't stand up to the evidence."

Interestingly, the widely pronounced antioxidant-cancerdefine link now proves ineffective too. In a separate U.S. trial which followed nearly 15,000 men to determine if vitamin C and E supplements were effective in cutting down the incidence of cancer found that both groups (active supplements and placebo) were equally susceptible to developing the disease.

The results of the study feature in the current issue of the Genes and Development journal.