At-home telomere testing is not a reliable marker of aging, researcher says

www.sciencenews.org ^ | 06/07/2018 | By Cori Vanchieri

[Red Badger]

Companies pledge to tell you your cellular age from a drop of blood. Don’t be so sure

Stay younger, longer. Great idea. But direct-to-consumer test kits that promise to gauge a person’s biological age by analyzing a drop of blood are not worth the $100 or so investment, says oncologist Mary Armanios. The tests measure the length of telomeres, the bits of DNA that cap and protect the ends of chromosomes. But the consumer tests are unreliable and can be misinterpreted, Armanios says.

“These kinds of tests can do harm, suggesting there is something wrong when there isn’t,” says the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine researcher, who uses a clinical test of telomere length to diagnose and treat people with certain rare disorders. Oncologist Mary Armanios Johns Hopkins Medicine

These kinds of tests can do harm, suggesting there is something wrong when there isn’t.

— Mary Armanios

Armanios gets calls from people who panic when they get their results from consumer tests. One man in his 40s was told his telomeres were those of an 80-year-old. He sold his house and quit work to make the most of the short time he was convinced he had left. Worse, she says, because he was under the misguided impression that surgeries shorten telomeres, he had decided to delay removal of a precancerous skin spot.

Armanios trained in the lab of Carol Greider, who shared the 2009 Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine for discovering telomerase, the enzyme that controls telomere lengthening (SN: 10/24/09, p. 14). Today Armanios is clinical director of the telomere center at Johns Hopkins.

[Trillian]

'Eat Pray Love' author Elizabeth Gilbert mourns death of partner Rayya Elias

I looked her up to see if they were still together and found this. My prediction is there will be a book and movie about this and she'll go back to destroying another man's life. They always put so much into being happy as a show for all to see, but they are truly miserable inside.

[fruser1]

” can do harm, suggesting there is something wrong when there isn’t”

Just like claiming second hand smoke is dangerous.

[Bellflower]

Wikipedia?

http://file.scirp.org/pdf/ABB_2016041514495653.pdf

https://www.nutraingredients-usa.com/Article/2016/11/23/Ashwagandha-root-extracts-shows-anti-aging-effect-Cell-study

https://www.superfoodly.com/lengthening-telomeres-astragalus-ta-65-product-b/

http://letsgothin.com/health-articles/how-to-optimize-your-health-through-telomerase-activation/

http://www.rechargebiomedical.com/ashwagandha-a-telomerase-activator/