You can learn this very easily! The image attached to this piece is very easy to understand if you think about it as a simple, common phrase in a language. Researchers in the Human Genome Project thought there would be 80,000 genes to account for human complexity. They were off—way off! There were only 20,000. That is because genetic signaling phrases like the one in this picture are used over and over.
If your wife says, “go fish”, that may mean one of several different things. She may just want you out of the house. She may really want some seafood. You might be playing a card game with your children, or she may have placed a bet on a fish in a race. The same exact phrase may have completely different meanings based on the setting. The language of life is exactly like that. The same phrases are used over and over. It is most like a computer code.
The critical gene signaling phrase in the picture with this post is used over and over. This image offers a simplified explanation of the core biology that leads to normal development, chronic disease, and aging. Each of the white boxes is a protein or a group of a few proteins produced by a gene (s). Look at the red box in the left upper corner of the diagram. Angiotensin II (ang II) is a critical molecule in normal fetal and childhood development. Angiotensin II is required to form a normal urinary system. Once the child becomes a healthy young adult with a fully formed urinary system, the genes that make ang II become much less active. Later in life processed foods lead to increased abdominal fat which makes more ang II. In children, ang II activation occurs in just the right time, in the right place, and for the proper duration to make a normal urinary system. Later in life persistent ang II activation is chaotic and uncoordinated. In that setting it causes more rapid aging and chronic disease development. All the red boxes except tobacco smoke are essential for the developing child but cause disease in older adults.
AngII circulates in the blood. It is also present in the fluid between cells. The AT1 receptor on the cell surface is like a glove and Ang II is like a baseball. When the glove catches the baseball, that activates processes within the cell that make extra oxidative particles or oxidants. Oxidants in turn activate the epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) which in turn activates the master metabolic switch mTOR. mTOR inactivates AMPK. AMPK and mTOR are related. When mTOR is activated, AMPK is deactivated. When you enter middle and old age, you will be healthy longer with inactivated mTOR and activated AMPK. That slows down aging and delays chronic disease development. Check out this link that reviews the benefits of inactivating mTOR in more detail.
As you can see, all the red boxes initiate the same gene signaling phrase. The medications and lifestyle factors in the green boxes block that signaling. When you combine the treatments in the green boxes, that slows aging, prolongs healthy life, and delays the onset of chronic conditions like artery disease and cancer. Of course, there is all kinds of complexity around these core signaling molecules, but this is the common process that occurs repeatedly in health and disease. Genes that are required for normal growth and development in children cause more rapid aging and chronic disease in adults. Now we can treat chronic disease very precisely, and we have 21 years of proof we can extend life by 8 years in humans.
Does this make it easier for you to understand how chronic disease is usually caused by normal genes? This is related to epigenetic regulation. It is related to which normal genes are switched on or off.