Poverty is not a vice, but it shortens telomeres
Chromosomes testify: poor people age fasterKirill Stasevich, Compulenta
The fact that poverty and longevity are incompatible is confirmed by chromosomes: telomeric sections of chromosomes in the poor are shortened several times faster than in the rich.
Researchers from the University of Glasgow managed to combine economics and molecular biology in a sense: in an article published in the online journal PLoS ONE (Shiels et al., Accelerated Telomere Attraction Is Associated with Relative Household Income, Diet and Inflammation in the pSoBid Cohort), they argue that a person's socio-economic status affects the length of telomeric sections of chromosomes.
Telomeres, as we all know well, are the end sections of chromosomes that shorten with each cell division. Over time, this shortening gets closer to vital genes, and this means that it's time to die. The length of telomeric sections thus determines the lifetime, and the sooner they shorten, the less the body has left.
The researchers found that in ten years, those residents of Glasgow whose annual family income was below 25 thousand pounds, telomeric sections of chromosomes shortened by 7.7%. In richer compatriots, telomeres have become shorter by only 0.6%. The same ratio was between those who rented housing and those who rented apartments (8.2% and 2.2%).
A similar difference in the melting of telomeres also reflected the quality of nutrition: in poorly fed chromosomes were shortened by 7.7%, in their "opponents" — only by 1.8%.
But nutrition is most likely only the most obvious factor that affects the rate of aging. A lower social position is associated with both purely physiological and psychological stresses that can contribute to the approach of old age. The largest Scottish city, as scientists say, because of the sharp social stratification, is an ideal environment for studying the influence of "sociology" on "biology". At the same time, the analysis covers a statistical sample, so it does not allow predicting the life span of a single poor person by his average annual income.
Prepared based on the materials of the University of Glasgow: Low income and poor diet linked to accelerated ageing
Portal "Eternal youth" http://vechnayamolodost.ru29.07.2011