11 Oct 2016 BANT Proud to be Participating in the Glycanage ®, King’s College London and Croatian National Centre of Excellence in Personalised Healthcare Research Project: “EFFECTS OF LIFESTYLE INTERVENTIONS ON CHANGES IN BIOLOGICAL AGE”
The British Association for Applied Nutrition and Nutritional Therapy (BANT) is proud to be working with Oxford Biotech company GlycanAge®, King’s College London and Croatian National Centre of Excellence in Personalised Healthcare in the ‘Effects of Lifestyle Interventions on Changes in Biological Age’ research study.
GlycanAge® is a pioneering new blood test, developed by an international team of scientific researchers who have published over 100 peer-reviewed publications in the fields of glycobiology and ageing in the last 20 years. A simple blood draw is needed to provide the sample that is analysed for the individual’s levels of glycans. Glycans are minute sugar molecules that attach to proteins molecules within the immune system, forming individual patterns. These patterns change as we age, often affected by our genes and lifestyle, including nutrition, obesity, smoking, exercise and stress. This new research project aims to enable people to test their real biological age and subsequently track how lifestyle changes may improve it.
BANT members will be working with the research team to recruit and supervise study participants and subsequently evaluate the results of the dietary and lifestyle changes. Study participants will be asked to participate by undergoing GlycanAge® testing three times at start, three and six month intervals. More information on the study and how to find a nutrition practitioner involved will be appearing on the BANT website (www.bant.org.uk) shortly.
BANT Chairman Miguel Toribio-Mateas, one of the study’s principal investigators, said: “The BANT framework of nutrition practice, based on functional medicine principles, provides the perfect clinical environment to assess biological ageing and to intervene by means of simple, individualised dietary and lifestyle interventions. Using reliable markers of biological ageing will help practitioners measure the effects of their recommendations and will enable them to learn more about the types of foods and behaviours most likely to keep us younger for longer. On the basis of these associations ‘anti-ageing’ dietary and lifestyle programmes can be developed to suit the individual. I am delighted that BANT has been chosen as the sole research partner for this study and look forward to seeing the results.“
Tim Spector, PhD, Professor of Genetic Epidemiology, King’s College London, says: “We have been studying ageing in twins for 20 years and studying many different markers and predictors of age and biological age. This is the best I have come across to date although we do not understand the mechanisms yet.”
“We are keen to get people involved in research to see how much we can change biological age by improving lifestyle and diet as we only have minimal data at the moment. This is a very exciting time for ageing research.”
The principal investigators on the project are: Tim Spector MD, PhD, Professor of Genetic Epidemiology, King’s College London; Gordan Lauc, PhD, Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Director of the Croatian National Centre of Excellence in Personalised Healthcare and Miguel Toribio-Mateas, BSc (Hons) MSc, Doctoral Researcher, Practice-Based Research on Healthy Ageing, Middlesex University, Chairman of BANT.
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FOR FURTHER INFORMATION PLEASE CONTACT:
Daniel O’Shaughnessy
Tel: +44 7540 722307
NOTES TO EDITORS:
The British Association for Applied Nutrition and Nutritional Therapy (BANT) is the professional body for Registered Nutritional Therapists. Its primary function is to assist its members in attaining the highest standards of integrity, knowledge, competence and professional practice, in order to protect the client’s interests; nutritional therapy and the registered nutritional therapist
