Diabetes Drug Slows Aging and Increases Lifespan

A study by Belgian doctoral researcher Wouter De Haes (KU Leuven) and colleagues provides new evidence that metformin, the world’s most widely used anti-diabetic drug, slows aging and increases lifespan. In the experiments, the researchers tease out the mechanism behind metformin’s age-slowing effects: the drug causes an increase in the number of toxic oxygen molecules released in the cell and this increases cell robustness and longevity in the long term. PNAS, June 2014