Live longer: Longevity expert reveals 3 nutritional tips
Diet plays a major role in our health and longevity, Joseph Antoun, doctor and CEO of L-Nutra, tells Business Insider
A healthy diet could protect us from some of the leading causes of death, including heart disease.
Antoun follows a plant-based longevity diet that focuses on nuts, complex carbohydrates and healthy fats.
What we eat probably has more influence on our health than any other factor. Many scientists agree on this, and a doctor and CEO of a longevity company also thinks so. Joseph Antoun’s company, L-Nutra, focuses primarily on nutrition, as it has a major impact on our gut microbiome, cholesterol levels, cell structure and much more, says the founder. According to Antoun, nutrition can play a major role in reducing the risk of diseases such as heart disease, cancer, stroke, diabetes and Alzheimer’s.
His Longevity Diet was developed by his colleague and L-Nutra co-founder Valter Longo. Longo is a professor of gerontology and director of the USC Longevity Institute. It is primarily a plant-based diet, but also includes fish a few times a week, lots of complex carbohydrates, and healthy fats from nuts. It is similar to the Mediterranean diet, which one study found can extend a person’s life by up to ten years. Antoun shared his three nutritional principles that he follows in hopes of living a long, healthy life.
Eating nuts daily for longevity
Nuts are a good source of plant-based protein, complex carbohydrates and healthy fats, says Antoun. He eats them pretty much every day. For breakfast, Antoun has nuts and a cup of coffee with a splash of oat or almond milk. He either eats the Nut Bar, which consists of walnuts, almonds, macadamia nuts and a little honey, or just whole nuts. Occasionally, he eats a Longevity Nut Cream, which consists mainly of almonds and cocoa powder, on a whole grain bread.
Research suggests that regular consumption of nuts could reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease. A large study published in 2017 in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology examined data from more than 200,000 people collected over a period of 32 years.
The study found that those who ate nuts five or more times a week had a 14 percent lower risk of cardiovascular disease and a 20 percent lower risk of coronary heart disease than people who never or almost never did so. According to the Mayo Clinic, nuts also lower the risk of high blood pressure, reduce “bad” cholesterol and reduce the risk of blood clots that can lead to a heart attack or stroke. This could also promote your longevity.
Eat lots of plant protein
Antoun eats mostly plant-based protein, including nuts, beans and chickpeas. There is compelling evidence that a plant-based diet can increase life expectancy. In a study published in JAMA Network Open in 2023, 22 pairs of twins were randomly assigned to either a healthy vegan or a healthy omnivorous diet for eight weeks.
At the end of the study, the vegan twins had significantly lower “bad” cholesterol, insulin levels and lower body weight – all factors associated with improved cardiovascular health. Another large study published in the journal JAMA Internal Medicine found that switching 3 percent of calories from animal protein to plant protein appears to reduce the risk of dying from any cause by 10 percent.
Eat dinner early and breakfast late to achieve longevity
Another component of Longo’s Longevity diet and the central element of L-Nutra’s business model is intermittent fasting. According to Longo’s website, participants must limit their meals to a period of twelve hours. They should also not eat anything three to four hours before going to bed. Antoun does this to ensure that he fasts for twelve hours each day: “I don’t eat overnight. It’s very important for me to eat dinner around seven o’clock and then wait until seven or eight o’clock the next day to eat breakfast.”
Fasting diets are popular with CEOs, celebrities and biohacking bros who hope to achieve weight loss, longevity and better focus. But as BI previously reported, the actual evidence lags behind the huge interest in fasting. Animal studies suggest that calorie restriction through fasting could increase longevity.
This is thought to be due to a process known as autophagy, in which cells begin to shed old, unusable parts when they are deprived of nutrients, but there is little evidence that this is the case in humans.
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