The Age-Well Project

WHY WALK IN WINTER?

I’ve just spent a month working in the Swiss Alps (yes, I know, lucky me!). As my accommodation was at the bottom of a valley surrounded by mountains, and as I had no car and there was no bus service on the valley floor, I spent a lot of time climbing a lot of mountains....

Shorter days, diets and dementia

It’s very autumnal in London right now, and the clocks ‘fall’ back this weekend. (It happens here a week earlier than in the USA and Canada – so don’t panic if you’re on the ‘other’ side of the Atlantic). While some, like my young adult daughters, welcome the extra hour in bed on Sunday, this...

YOGURT, YOGURT AND MORE YOGURT

Back in March, shortly after she died at the age of 117, we reported on the longest living woman, Maria Branyas. So I was intrigued to read a full study of her genes, microbiome and other relevant ‘body-parts’ published at the end of September – this examination resulted in a comprehensive analysis of her biological...

Ageing well and the quest for immortality

This is definitely the first, and – I suspect – the last, blog post I write inspired by Vladimir Putin. Bear with me. I know it’s strange, and we’ll have to side step, if we can, the horrors of the war in Ukraine, and keep this focussed on ageing well. I was struck by unguarded...

PERFECT JOY, SUPPLEMENTS AND SARDINES

One of the books I read over the summer was a biography of Karen Blixen/Isak Dinesen, the Danish author best known for her memoir, Out of Africa. She was more extraordinary as an older woman than as a younger women, blossoming in spite of the frequent pain that came from syphilis (passed to her by...