Fat-Containing Foods Found to Affect Telomere Length

by | Jun 10, 2013 | 2013, Women's Health

Written by Greg Arnold, DC, CSCS.  All short and medium chain saturated fatty acids, except lauric acid (in coconut oil) may make aging more rapid. 

Our DNA gives us a signal as to how fast we age through a structure at the end of each of the chromosomes that houses our DNA called a telomere. Telomeres protect the ends of chromosomes (1), but every time our cells divide our telomeres shorten and this is believed to be a marker for the aging process (2).

While the exact way to find out how telomeres shorten is still not fully understood, dietary factors are thought to play an important role (3, 4). Now a new study (5) suggests that diets containing higher amounts of fat may hamper the health of our telomeres.

The study involved 4,029 postmenopausal women participating in the Women’s Health Initiative (6). The women provided dietary information on total fat intake, individual fatty acids, and fat-rich foods via a questionnaire. There were 19 questions on the type of fat intake and 122 questions on portion size and how frequently they consumed food items (7). They then provided blood samples to have their telomere length measured by a process called quantitative polymerase chain reaction that’s been done in previous research (8).

The researchers found that diets containing higher amounts of fat were associated with shorter telomere length.  Specifically, those with the highest intake of short-to-medium chain saturated fatty acids (1.29% of total calories) had 3% shorter telomeres (4.0 vs. 4.13 kilo base pairs) compared to those with the lowest intake of short-to-medium chain saturated fatty acids (0.29% of calories) (p = 0.046). The fat-containing food sources found to be most deleterious to telomere length were non-skim milk, butter, and whole-milk cheese. The researchers found that substituting 1% of calories from short-to-medium-chain fatty acid with any other energy source was associated with 119 base pair longer telomeres.

The only medium-chain fatty acid that did not have a deleterious effect on telomere length was lauric acid, the primary medium chain fat found in coconut oil. No significant associations were found with long-chain saturated fatty acids, monounsaturated fatty acids, and polyunsaturated fatty acids.

While admitting that “higher intakes of short to medium-chain fatty acids were associated with shorter telomere length among postmenopausal women” and that “these findings suggest the potential roles of short to medium-chain fatty acids in the rate of biological aging”, the researchers concluded that “prospective studies are clearly warranted to further investigate the role of short to medium-chain fatty acids in affecting changes in telomere length among postmenopausal women, and the possible role of telomere length in mediating subsequent disease occurrence.”

Source: Song, Yan, et al. “Intake of small-to-medium-chain saturated fatty acids is associated with peripheral leukocyte telomere length in postmenopausal women.” The Journal of nutrition (2013): jn-113.

© 2013 by the American Society for Nutrition

Posted June 10, 2013.

Greg Arnold is a Chiropractic Physician practicing in Hauppauge, NY. You can contact Dr. Arnold directly by emailing him at PitchingDoc@msn.com or visiting his web site at www.PitchingDoc.com

References:

  1. Anderson GL,Manson J,Wallace R, Lund B,Hall D, Davis S, Shumaker S, Wang CY, Stein E, Prentice RL. Implementation of the Women’s Health Initiative study design. Ann Epidemiol. 2003;13:S5–17.
  2. Harley CB, Futcher AB, Greider CW. Telomeres shorten during ageing of human fibroblasts. Nature. 1990;345:458–60.
  3. Slagboom PE, Droog S, Boomsma DI. Genetic determination of telomere size in humans: a twin study of three age groups. Am J Hum Genet. 1994;55:876–82.
  4. Valdes AM, Andrew T, Gardner JP, Kimura M, Oelsner E, Cherkas LF, Aviv A, Spector TD. Obesity, cigarette smoking, and telomere length in women. Lancet. 2005;366:662–4.
  5. Song Y. Intake of Small-to-Medium-Chain Saturated Fatty Acids Is Associated with Peripheral Leukocyte Telomere Length in Postmenopausal Women. Jou Nutr 2013; 143(6):907-914.
  6. Hays J, Hunt JR, Hubbell FA, Anderson GL, Limacher M, Allen C, Rossouw JE. The Women’s Health Initiative recruitment methods and results. Ann Epidemiol. 2003;13:S18–77.
  7. Patterson RE, Kristal AR, Tinker LF, Carter RA, Bolton MP, Agurs- Collins T.Measurement characteristics of the Women’s Health Initiative food frequency questionnaire. Ann Epidemiol. 1999;9:178–87.
  8. You NC, Chen BH, Song Y, Lu X, Chen Y, Manson JE, Kang M, Howard BV, Margolis KL, et al. A prospective study of leukocyte telomere length and risk of type 2 diabetes in postmenopausal women. Diabetes. 2012;61:2998–3004.