University of Eastern England has determined that “therapeutic” starvation, despite popularity in recent years, can negatively affect the health of children and grandchildren. The unexpected danger of low-calorie diets is reported in an article published in the Journal Proceedings of The Royal Society B. Briefly about scientific work communicates in a press release on MedicalXpress.
Experts conducted experiments on round worms of Caenorhabditis Elegans, which serve as a modeling body in studies of aging processes due to a man of molecular paths. It turned out that a decrease in calorie consumption pernicably affects three generations of offspring in invertebrates, even when these descendants have access to unlimited nutrition. Although it is known that starvation can increase the life expectancy of many animals and potentially can improve the health of people, long-term consequences have so far been understood poorly.
In the course of the study, biologists studied 2.5 thousand worms covering four generations. The first generation of invertebrates was divided into groups, each of which was placed in one of the four environments, including the one where they could receive unlimited food, and the one where they had to starve. Their descendants were translated either on a full diet, or on a hungry diet.
It turned out that starvation really increased the life expectancy of worms, and also made them more prolific. However, if future generations had access to unlimited nutrition, productivity during the reproduction of offspring decreased.