Red wine can make you live longer and feel better while you're at it, a new Italian study indicates.
A chemical in the wine slows ageing and wards off two things the elderly often gripe about, feeling weaker and slower on the uptake, the scientists said. The researchers gave the wine molecule, an anti-oxidant called resveratrol, to the killifish - a tropical fish whose short life span makes it ideal for ageing studies.
The molecule produced a 30% lifespan boost and slowed the appearance of the two typical bugbears, a slackening of muscles and a slowdown in learning abilities. Fish, while seeming stolid creatures, are able to pick up things, scientists have recently discovered.
Goldfish, for instance, quickly learned how to avoid pain.
Researchers Alessandro Cellerino of Pisa University and Antonino Cattaneo of Lay Line Genomics said their experiment provided the clearest evidence yet that red wine can help animals live longer.
The apparent elixir - the thing that makes wine skins red - should work for higher vertebrates like humans, they added. The Italian study, set for publication in the US journal Current Biology, would seem to corroborate Harvard research on the effects of resveratrol on worms, fruit flies and monkeys.
In the monkeys, at least, the substance appeared to work by making them eat less. A low-calorie diet has often been linked to long life. Before gaining its claim to fame as an anti-ageing agent, resveratrol has also been touted as promoting good health by
preventing a battery of ailments including heart disease, influenza and Alzheimer's Disease.
The killifish, or killi, is a freshwater fish common in tropical waters.
Their bright colours, small size and undemanding nature have given them a devoted, almost fanatical following among aquarium hobbyists world wide. Fish fans may love them but they have to stock up regularly because killies only live about three months in the wild and barely longer in fish tanks.
The killi used by the Italians, whose scientific name is Nothobranchius furzeri, is thought to be the shortest-lived vertebrate in the animal kingdom.
