Dietary restriction increases variability in longevity

A M Senior; S Nakagawa; D Raubenheimer; S J Simpson; D W A Noble

doi:10.1098/rsbl.2017.0057

Dietary restriction increases variability in longevity

Biol Lett. 2017 Mar;13(3):20170057. doi: 10.1098/rsbl.2017.0057.

Authors

A M Senior^{1

2}, S Nakagawa³, D Raubenheimer^{4

5}, S J Simpson^{4

5}, D W A Noble³

Affiliations

¹ Charles Perkins Centre, The University of Sydney, New South Wales 2006, Australia alistair.senior@sydney.edu.au.
² School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Sydney, New South Wales 2006, Australia.
³ Evolution and Ecology Research Centre and School of Biological, Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of New South Wales, Sydney, New South Wales 2052, Australia.
⁴ Charles Perkins Centre, The University of Sydney, New South Wales 2006, Australia.
⁵ School of Life and Environmental Sciences, The University of Sydney, New South Wales 2006, Australia.

Abstract

Nutritional environments, particularly those experienced during early life, are hypothesized to affect longevity. A recent cross-taxa meta-analysis found that, depending upon circumstance, average longevity may be increased or decreased by early-life dietary restriction. Unstudied are the effects of diet during development on among-individual variance in longevity. Here, we address this issue using emerging methods for meta-analysis of variance. We found that, in general, standard deviation (s.d.) in longevity is around 8% higher under early-life dietary restriction than a standard diet. The effects became especially profound when dietary insults were experienced prenatally (s.d. increased by 29%) and/or extended into adulthood (s.d. increased by 36.6%). Early-life dietary restriction may generate variance in longevity as a result of increased variance in resource acquisition or allocation, but the mechanisms underlying these largely overlooked patterns clearly warrant elucidation.

Keywords: caloric restriction; early development; lifespan; meta-analysis; nutrition; variance.

Publication types

Meta-Analysis
Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Analysis of Variance
Animals
Caloric Restriction*
Female
Life Cycle Stages / physiology
Longevity / physiology*
Pregnancy
Prenatal Nutritional Physiological Phenomena
Species Specificity

Associated data

figshare/10.6084/m9.figshare.c.3704704