Effect of voluntary exercise on longevity of rats.
Level 5 - mechanism / opinion, no new human data
Animal research (non-human experimental model)
PubMed 4055572 · doi:10.1152/jappl.1985.59.3.826
What was done
Rats were assigned to voluntary wheel running exercise and compared with three sedentary control groups: freely eating controls, pair-fed controls, and food-restricted paired-weight controls. Running distance was measured as rats aged from 9 to 30 months, and overall survival, life-span, and causes of death (including malignancy incidence) were assessed.
What was found
Voluntary running decreased from approximately 4 to approximately 1 mile/day as rats aged from 9 to 30 months. Exercising rats had a significantly higher mean lifespan than sedentary freely eating controls and sedentary pair-fed controls (1,012 ± 138 vs. 923 ± 160 and 928 ± 186 days), but lived significantly less long than food-restricted paired-weight sedentary controls (1,113 ± 150 days). Food-restricted paired-weight rats demonstrated true life-span extension and a significantly lower incidence of malignancies. Exercising rats had no significant difference in cause of death compared to freely eating or pair-fed sedentary controls.
Why it matters
This study demonstrates that while physical activity improves survival in rodents, it does not reproduce the true life-span extension or cancer-preventive effects seen with caloric restriction.
Limits
The study was performed in rats and cannot be directly translated to human longevity. The abstract does not report the total sample size, animal strain, or sex, and does not provide molecular or metabolic biomarker measurements.
Cited by
- supports In animals, exercise alone without calorie restriction or intermittent fasting produces only a minimal lifespan extension (around 5%).