\u201cThese results highlight our own resilience,\u201d senior co-author Dr James White<\/a>, from the Duke University School of Medicine, told BBC Science Focus<\/em>: \u201cWe don\u2019t give enough credit that the body can reset.\u201d<\/p>\n While chronological age represents the number of years you have been alive, biological age is defined by how much your DNA<\/a> has been altered by a chemical reaction called methylation.<\/p>\n Your biological age is influenced by factors like disease, lifestyle, environmental factors. Stress, whether physical or mental, has also been found to rapidly age a biological clock.<\/p>\n The new study, published in Cell Metabolism<\/em><\/a>, shows that your biological age is much more flexible than your chronological age. In fact, people can be biologically older or younger than their chronological age.<\/p>\n The researchers say that the discovery that biological age is \u201cfluid, fluctuating and malleable\u201d challenges the long-held belief that it can only go up, like chronological age. This research is the first to explore the question of ageing being reversible in humans.<\/p>\n In the study, researchers challenged the theory that somebody\u2019s biological age is overwhelming determined by their chronological age \u2013 that methylation levels change predictably over time. Methylation levels were measured in human participants following surgery, pregnancy, and severe cases of COVID-19.<\/p>\n The researchers found that methylation levels in participants were different from the predicted levels for their chronological age. This meant their biological age was lower or higher (depending on the amount of methylation in their DNA) than their chronological age.<\/p>\n Severe stress has been previously linked to higher mortality rates by increasing biological age due to increased susceptibility to stress-related diseases.<\/p>\n In the same way, the new study shows that reversing your biological age can decrease<\/em> your mortality. According to Dr Vadim Gladyshev<\/a>, co-senior author of the study, this suggests that \u201cthe ability to recover from stress may be an important determinant of successful ageing and longevity\u201d \u2013 in other words, how well we grow old.<\/p>\n The results of the study suggest that your biological age may now also be a useful measure of your stress levels and how well you have recovered.<\/p>\n As the study shows that our bodies are able to induce this reversal naturally, it provokes questions as to whether we might be able to reverse our age below<\/em> the recovery baseline.<\/p>\n Read more:<\/strong><\/p>\n It\u2019s almost a yes from Dr White, who says that \u201cwe wear stress, and I imagine that would translate to a physiological response\u201d.<\/p>\n But is the kind of bad day that gives you dark circles under your eyes enough to accelerate biological ageing as much as surgery or, say, pregnancy? \u201cProbably not\u201d, says White. \u201cBut if you are stressed for months or years, that might be enough\u201d.<\/p>\n It\u2019s one of the key questions that the researchers are taking forward: how stressed you need to actually be before you accelerate your biological age \u2013 and therefore have the need to reduce it again. It also remains unclear whether we can bring down accelerated ageing over a longer time period.<\/p>\n While the study did not pursue whether recovery must be active or passive, White speculates that a combination of physical and mental rest is important to recovery \u2013 and if either is lacking then the other will be limited.<\/p>\n Recovery is mostly a passive process, according to White, but an often-neglected aspect of recovery is the mental side which some people might need extra help with. For example, if you start walking again after surgery some people think \u201cyou must be better\u201d \u2013 but it is important not to ignore the psychological aspect of recovery.<\/p>\n The results also showed some variability that suggests that some people might be better at recovering than others.<\/p>\n The study began with a process known as heterochronic parabiosis, which involves surgically attaching pairs of young and old mice together so they share one circulation. The infusion of young blood into the older mouse induces a reversal of its biological age \u2013 but for the young mouse, the stress of being exposed to aged blood increases its biological age. The study found that this was temporary, and the young mouse returned to its baseline biological age after recovery.<\/p>\n These initial results prompted the researchers to theorise that other stressful situations \u2013 such as pregnancy, getting serious cases of COVID-19, and experiencing major surgery \u2013 could also trigger reversible changes to biological age in humans.<\/p>\n They found that the rapid increases in biological age caused by emergency surgery can be restored to baseline just days after the procedure. And in the case of recovering COVID-19 patients, an immunosuppressive drug called \u2018tocilizumab\u2019 enhanced biological recovery.<\/p>\n As with much research, the results of this study perhaps throw up more than they answer \u2013 such as what the \u2018common denominator\u2019 is: the thing driving the stress in events like catching COVID-19 or pregnancy. Is it as simple as cortisol levels, or is something else involved? And, \u201cjust as importantly\u201d, says White: \u201cWhat needs to go down to reset biological age?\u201d<\/p>\n Further research following this study will also tackle questions concerning differences between males and females, as well as the relationship between short-term fluctuations in biological and long-term trends: does short-term stress accelerate your ageing later in life?<\/p>\n Dr James White is an assistant research professor in cell biology at Duke University School of Medicine. His research has been published in journals including Frontiers In Cell And Developmental Biology<\/em> and Mechanisms Of Ageing And Development.<\/em><\/p>\n Read more:<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p><\/div> <\/section> <\/body><\/html>\n Your biological age is ticking, but this study shows how you can slow it down \u2013 and even turn it around. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":26512,"template":"","categories":[1],"acf":{"readingTimeMinutes":"6"},"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2023\/04\/heres-how-you-can-reverse-your-biological-age-according-to-breakthrough-new-study.jpg",1200,540,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2023\/04\/heres-how-you-can-reverse-your-biological-age-according-to-breakthrough-new-study-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2023\/04\/heres-how-you-can-reverse-your-biological-age-according-to-breakthrough-new-study-300x135.jpg",300,135,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2023\/04\/heres-how-you-can-reverse-your-biological-age-according-to-breakthrough-new-study-768x346.jpg",768,346,true],"large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2023\/04\/heres-how-you-can-reverse-your-biological-age-according-to-breakthrough-new-study-1024x461.jpg",800,360,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2023\/04\/heres-how-you-can-reverse-your-biological-age-according-to-breakthrough-new-study.jpg",1200,540,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2023\/04\/heres-how-you-can-reverse-your-biological-age-according-to-breakthrough-new-study.jpg",1200,540,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"Your biological age is ticking, but this study shows how you can slow it down \u2013 and even turn it around.","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed\/26511"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/rss_feed"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26512"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26511"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26511"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Does recovering from stress \u2013 and reversing your biological age \u2013 make you visibly less old?<\/strong><\/h3>\n
If we want to help ourselves recover from stress, what should we do?<\/strong><\/h3>\n
![\"""\"](\""https:\/\/images.immediate.co.uk\/production\/volatile\/sites\/4\/2023\/04\/ageing-eyes-386dedb.jpg?quality=90&resize=620%2C366"\" "\\"\"\"\\"\/")
<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div>How did they find these results?<\/strong><\/h3>\n
What does this mean for the future?<\/strong><\/h3>\n
About our expert<\/strong><\/h4>\n
","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"