Those early-bird dining specials may help you live a longer life

The next time you go out for dinner, you may want to consider an early-bird special. A new study suggests that eating earlier and avoiding late-night snacks can extend the lifespan.

Researchers found that an early meal, followed by a stretch of fasting, lengthened the lifespan of laboratory mice by 35%.

Previous research has found that dietary restriction can extend lifespan. So can low-calorie diets and fasting. The new study found that the timing of meals can also significantly impact lifespan.

As part of the study, mice that ate the quantity of food they wanted whenever they wanted to have a median lifespan of 800 days. Mice on a calorie-restricted diet with food available around the clock lived 10% longer, about 875 days. Mice on the calorie-restricted diet that ate only during the inactive phase of their circadian cycle and fasted for 12 hours overnight lived almost 20% longer than the controls, or 959 days.

But calorie-restricted mice that only ate during their active phase, then fasted for the remaining 12 hours, lived the longest, 1,068 days, nearly 35% longer than the control animals.

“We have discovered a new facet to caloric restriction that dramatically extends lifespan in our lab animals,” senior author Joseph Takahashi, told Medical News Today. “If these findings hold true in people, we might want to rethink whether we really want that midnight snack.”

Takahashi, a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator and chair of neuroscience at UT Southwestern Medical Center, also found that calorie-restricted diets improved the mice’s regulation of glucose levels and insulin sensitivity, with the most significant improvements in mice that ate only during their active phase.

Researchers found that aging increased the activity of genes involved in inflammation and decreased the activity of genes involved in metabolism and circadian rhythms. Calorie restriction slowed these age-related changes, but mice that only ate at night benefited most.

“Since aging can be considered a progressive ramping up of inflammation, [reducing calories] is also delaying this age-related increase in inflammation, which is also consistent with delaying the aging process,” said Takahashi.

More research is needed to determine if these mouse-study findings apply to humans, but the results underscore Methuselah Foundation’s view that the way to fight the effects of aging will involve a variety of approaches. All of our investments and initiatives are guided by seven strategies we believe are critical to extending the healthy human lifespan. 

We believe that finding solutions around those strategies will help us achieve our mission of making 90 the new 50 by 2030.