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A pilot human clinical trial conducted by researchers at Baylor College of Medicine finds that supplementation with GlyNAC – a combination of glycine and N-acetylcysteine as precursors to the natural antioxidant glutathione – could improve many defects related to age in older humans to improve muscle strength and cognition, and promote healthy aging.
Published in the newspaper Clinical and translational medicine, the results of this study show that older people taking GlyNAC for 24 weeks saw improvements in many of the defects characteristic of aging, including glutathione deficiency, oxidative stress, mitochondrial dysfunction, inflammation, resistance insulin, endothelial dysfunction, body fat, genomic toxicity, muscle strength, gait speed, exercise capacity and cognitive function. The benefits waned after stopping supplementation for 12 weeks. GlyNAC supplementation was well tolerated during the study period.
“There is limited understanding of why these defects occur in older humans, and effective interventions to reverse these defects are currently limited or absent,” said corresponding author endocrinologist Dr Rajagopal Sekhar, associate professor of medicine in the section of endocrinology, diabetes Metabolism at Baylor.
For 20 years, Sekhar and his team have studied natural aging in older humans and aged mice. Their work brings mitochondria, known as the cell’s batteries, along with free radicals and glutathione to the table about why we age.
Mitochondrial dysfunction and aging
Mitochondria generate the energy necessary to support cellular functions by burning fat and sugar from food, therefore mitochondrial health is of critical importance for life. Sekhar believes that improving the health of defective mitochondria as we age is key.
As mitochondria generate energy, they produce waste products such as free radicals. These highly reactive molecules can damage cells, membranes, lipids, proteins and DNA. Cells depend on antioxidants, like glutathione, the most abundant antioxidant in our cells, to neutralize these toxic free radicals. Failure to neutralize free radicals leads to harmful and damaging oxidative stress which can affect mitochondrial function.
Interestingly, glutathione levels in older people are much lower than in younger people, and oxidative stress levels are much higher.
Animal studies conducted in Sekhar’s lab have shown that restoring glutathione levels by providing GlyNAC reverses glutathione deficiency, reduces oxidative stress, and completely restores mitochondrial function in aged mice.
“In previous work, we have shown that supplementing HIV patients with GlyNAC improves the multiple deficits associated with premature aging seen in these patients,” Sekhar said. “In this study, we wanted to understand the effects of GlyNAC supplementation on many age-related defects in the elderly.”
GlyNAC improves several characteristic defects of aging
The world’s elderly population is growing rapidly, accompanied by an increase in many age-related diseases. To understand what causes unhealthy aging, scientific research has identified nine characteristic flaws that are believed to contribute to the aging process.
“It is believed that correcting these signs of aging could improve or reverse many age-related disorders and help people age in healthier ways,” Sekhar said. “However, we do not fully understand why these characteristic defects occur, and there is currently no solution to correct even a single defect characteristic of aging.”
This is where the results of Sekhar’s trial become encouraging, as supplementing with GlyNAC for 24 weeks appears to improve four of the nine characteristic defects of aging.
To better understand whether GlyNAC holds the keys to mitochondrial recovery and more, Sekhar and his team conducted this pilot clinical trial.
“We worked with eight adults between the ages of 70 and 80, comparing them to younger same-sex adults between the ages of 21 and 30,” Sekhar said. “We measured glutathione in red blood cells, oxidation of mitochondrial fuel, plasma biomarkers of oxidative stress and oxidative damage, inflammation, endothelial function, glucose and insulin, walking speed, muscle strength, exercise capacity, cognitive testing, genetic damage, rate of glucose production and muscle protein breakdown and body composition. Before taking GlyNAC, all of these measurements were abnormal in older people compared to younger people. “
Older participants took GlyNAC for 24 weeks and then stopped for 12 weeks. Sekhar and colleagues repeated the above measurements midway through 12 weeks, after 24 weeks of taking GlyNAC, and again after stopping GlyNAC for 12 weeks.
“We are very excited about the results,” Sekhar said. “After taking GlyNAC for 24 weeks, all of these blemishes in the elderly improved and some returned to levels found in young adults.” The researchers also determined that older adults tolerated GlyNAC well for 24 weeks. The benefits, however, waned after stopping GlyNAC supplementation for 12 weeks.
“I’m especially encouraged by the improvements in cognition and muscle strength,” Sekhar said. “Alzheimer’s disease and mild cognitive impairment (MCI) are serious medical conditions affecting memory in the elderly and leading to dementia, and there are no effective solutions for these disorders. We are exploring the possibility that GlyNAC may help with these conditions by conducting two pilot randomized clinical trials to test whether GlyNAC supplementation could improve cognitive decline defects in Alzheimer’s disease and MCI, and possibly improve function. cognitive. “
“The overall results of the current study are very encouraging,” Sekhar said. “They suggest that GlyNAC supplementation could be a simple and viable method to promote and improve healthy aging in the elderly. We call it the ‘Power of 3’ because we believe it takes the combined benefits of glycine, NAC and glutathione to achieve this goal. We have also completed a randomized clinical trial of GlyNAC supplementation versus placebo in the elderly and these results will be available soon. “
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