The longevity supplement industry and the actual longevity science are almost completely separate things
The geroscience research happening at places like the Buck Institute, Mayo Clinic, and NIA is genuinely interesting. Senolytics — dasatinib + quercetin — have cleared senescent cells in human trials with measurable results. The TAME trial is running metformin, a $10 generic diabetes drug, through a proper multi-site human RCT to test whether it slows biological aging markers. Rapamycin has the most consistent rodent data of anything tested and a growing number of doctors are prescribing it off-label for life extension while actual trial data is collected.
None of this is what you're being sold.
The supplement industry running parallel to the science sells NMN (an NAD+ precursor), resveratrol, and similar compounds at $60-100/month based on mouse studies that either didn't replicate in humans or were conducted at doses impossible to reach with a pill. David Sinclair's resveratrol research has been contested repeatedly in the literature. NMN human trials are still preliminary and the effect sizes aren't close to what the marketing implies.
Bryan Johnson's Blueprint project is interesting as a case study in what the full-commitment version looks like — 100+ biomarker tests, documented everything, published openly. But it's also an N=1 experiment by a billionaire, which tells you something about who the current version of this is actually for.
The distance between "mice live 20% longer" and "this works in humans and is safe long-term" is where almost everything breaks down. Is anyone actually tracking the legitimate research side of this? And does it change your view of the supplement half?
0 replies