Now Let's Move to Healthy Human Longevity
You are probably thinking. Isn’t this site about human chronic disease and healthier longer lives. What’s all this talk about whales? Understanding the difference between human genes and whale genes helps us understand the potential for longer human lives. While humans and bowhead whales share the same fundamental mammalian genetic blueprint, the bowhead whale genome contains specific, advantageous mutations and gene expression patterns in critical pathways related to DNA repair, cancer resistance, and cellular stress management. These subtle yet powerful differences in specific gene functions are believed to be the primary reason for their extraordinary longevity and robust health compared to humans and other mammals. Studying these differences offers valuable insights into the biology of aging and disease for potential human application.
That means it is critically important for every human who is serious about a longer healthier life to know something about the DNA computer code. Our life begins when a human egg is fertilized. That single tiny microscopic basic cell contains the entire computer code to construct a fully functional human adult with teeth, hair, and eyeballs. That single human cell is also effectively a 3d printer. That single cell divides and then divides again and again to “print” our bodies. This is where gene regulation or epigenetics comes in. That fertilized egg becomes a healthy young adult through a perfect symphony with specific genes in the code being activated in just the right place, at just the right time, at just the right intensity, for the perfect duration.
The code is so powerful there is also “artificial intelligence” involved. The lives of hundreds of generations of horses have “trained” the horse genetic code so that newborn horses can walk, nurse, and recognize danger the first day they are born. The DNA code influences every part of our lives from our personality type to our physical and mental potential. This science is advancing very fast and it is the new frontier of medicine.
The best news of all is that this science has practical application to extend our healthier lives right now. Let’s go back to this statement from the first paragraph: “the bowhead whale genome contains specific, advantageous mutations and gene expression patterns in critical pathways related to DNA repair, cancer resistance, and cellular stress management.”
Bowhead whales and humans both share a master genetic survival switch called AMPK that integrates cellular stress management. AMPK (AMP-activated protein kinase) is master regulator that plays a critical role in integrating and orchestrating cellular responses to various forms of stress. Cellular stresses threaten cell survival. AMPK is therefore a survival switch at the cell, organ, and whole body level.
It’s original function was to enhance survival of the fetus. If food is abundant, AMPK activity is very low. If there is no food, AMPK activity is maximized to pull calories from fat and muscle to provide the energy to support health in fetal cells and organs until there is food again. Over billions of years, AMPK has evolved to promote cell and organ survival from other threats like DNA damage.
Please remember that a core reason for the longevity of bowhead whales is their excellent DNA damage repair. DNA damage is a form of cellular stress. AMPK is activated in response to DNA damage. Our AMPK and whale AMPK are very similar. Even if the AMPK protein itself is very similar, the regulation of AMPK expression or its activation/deactivation could differ between species. For example, a bowhead whale's cells might maintain AMPK in a more active state, or it might respond more robustly to certain cellular stresses, contributing to its enhanced cellular resilience and longevity. That is the key phrase. The whales may have more active AMPK or it may rise more in response to stresses. AMPK activity reduces oxidant production and bolsters antioxidant defenses to prevent DNA damage. More active AMPK significantly bolsters DNA repair processes. This is a crucial aspect of its role as a master regulator of cellular stress and its contributions to cellular longevity and healthspan.
Every factor that we know that prolongs healthy human life increases AMPK activity. That includes eating less, intermittent fasting, exercise, lisinopril or losartan and eplerenone or spironolactone for hypertension, statins for cholesterol, and metformin or Jardiance for diabetes. That is why lifestyle alone cannot maximally prolong your healthy life. That is why a protocol integrating all these elements is so powerful. If you have had a heart attack and you are on a best practice protocol like this you are ten times as likely to be alive in five years. If you are a diabetic with chronic kidney disease on a best practice protocol you will live 8 years longer with less risk of serious complications.
Dr. Milton Parker is a cardiologist and one of the foremost experts on congestive heart failure. He said this in the leading diabetes journal Diabetes Care: “it is now critical for physicians to reconceptualize SGLT2 inhibitors (like Jardiance) as organ-protective agents rather than glucose-lowering drugs. The antihyperglycemic action of these drugs represents a tiny fraction of their broad portfolio of effects, which (when fully exercised) cause an adaptive reprogramming of stressed cells in a manner that promotes homeostasis and survival.” Jardiance activates AMPK to protect the kidneys and heart whether the patient is diabetic or not. That is the potential of the new science of medicine. The old medicine focused on risk factors, organs, and specialists focused on those organs belongs in the past. We must move now to a system rooted in outpatient primary care teams that use protocols to protect every cell and organ in the body. The future is now!
Such an understandable description and explanation of DNA, thank you!