Can pure oxygen reverse effects of ageing? People placed in pressurised chambers gain significant benefits from breathing clean air, research shows
- Breathing pure oxygen may help to reverse the ageing process, scientists claim
- Found those put in pressurised oxygen chambers gained significant benefits
- Sessions lasted 90 minutes each and took place for five days a week over three months
Breathing pure oxygen may help to reverse the ageing process, the scientists behind a breakthrough study claim.
They found that subjects put in pressurised oxygen chambers gained significant benefits.
Firstly, it enabled telomeres – the protective caps on chromosomes – to regrow by more than 20 per cent.
Telomeres naturally become shorter with age, leading to illnesses including cancer, Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s.
Scientists at Tel Aviv University found that breathing in oxygen whilst sitting in a pressurised chamber enabled telomeres – the protective caps on chromosomes – to regrow. (Stock image)
But in the experiment they grew back to the length of people 25 years younger.
The study also found that the number of senescent cells – which prevent regeneration as they build up in the body – was cut by up to 37 per cent. Removing the so-called zombie cells can extend life.
Professor Shai Efrati of the Faculty of Medicine at Tel Aviv University said: ‘Since telomere shortening is considered the ‘Holy Grail’ of the biology of ageing, many pharmacological and environmental interventions are being extensively explored in the hopes of enabling telomere elongation.
‘The significant improvement of telomere length shown during and after these unique protocols provides the scientific community with a new foundation of understanding that ageing can indeed be targeted and reversed at the basic cellular-biological level.’
In the study, published in the journal Ageing, 35 healthy adults aged 64 and older breathed in 100 per cent oxygen through a mask whilst sitting in pressurised chambers.
The sessions lasted 90 minutes each and took place for five days a week over three months.
The pressurised chamber mimics a state of ‘hypoxia’, or oxygen shortage, enabling tissues to dissolve more oxygen which has well-known regenerative effects.
The sessions lasted 90 minutes each and took place for five days a week over three months. (Stock image)
Previous trials revealed that healthy eating and high-intensity exercise can also preserve telomere length – but this experiment far outdid natural interventions, the researches explained.
Study researcher Dr Amir Hadanny, of Tel Aviv’s Sagol Center for Hyperbaric Medicine and Research, said: ‘Until now, interventions such as lifestyle modifications and intense exercise were shown to have some inhibition effect on the expected telomere length shortening.
‘However, what is remarkable to note in our study is that, in just three months of therapy, we were able to achieve such significant telomere elongation – at rates far beyond any of the current available interventions or lifestyle modifications.’
