Fasting and Autophagy in Humans: Summary Calls Link Unproven

THE ARISING · LONGEVITY & HEALTHSPAN SUNDAY, OCTOBER 18, 2026 IN THIS EDITION · LONGEVITY & HEALTHSPAN 1 ACOG Now Recommends Hormone Therapy for Many Women With Hot Flashes 2 Cardiologists Urge Doctors to Prescribe Exercise as Routine Heart Care 3 Fasting and Autophagy in Humans: Summary Calls Link Unproven 4 Gut Supplements May Modestly Improve Cognition in Adults Over 60, Review Finds 5 Higher Ultra-Processed Food Intake Linked to Silent Brain Damage on MRI 6 Higher VO2 Max Linked to Lower Depression and Anxiety Risk in UK Biobank 7 Bonn Lab Study Shows Blood Cells From Older Donors Lose Epigenetic Age in a Dish 8 Longer Sleep Linked to Kidney Disease Risk in Type 2 Diabetes LONGEVITY & HEALTHSPAN · WEEKLY READ · 2 MIN BIOCHEMICAL SOCIETY TRANSACTIONS Fasting and Autophagy in Humans: Summary Calls Link Unproven Skipping food for a day or three is often sold as a way to switch on the body's cellular cleanup. According to our research desk's notes on a review in Biochemical Society Transactions, that has not been shown in people. Everything below rests on those desk notes alone. No independent coverage was available, the paper's text could not be retrieved, and none of it has been checked against the paper. Treat it as a report of what the review is said to conclude, not as verified findings. his article is based on those notes. The paper itself was not reviewed. T The cleanup process is called autophagy. It is the cell's recycling system. According to the notes, researchers at Adelaide University and the South Australian Health and Medical Research Institute (SAHMRI) looked at human studies of fasting, intermittent fasting, calorie restriction and changes in protein intake. They wanted to know whether any of these raise autophagy. The notes name the authors as Sanjna Singh and Timothy J. Sargeant and say they call diet-driven autophagy in humans "plausible but unproven." We could not confirm that wording against the paper. THE ARISING · OCTOBER 18, 2026 PAGE 9 One problem, according to the notes, is how the studies measured it. Most human studies took a single snapshot of autophagy-related genes or proteins. That does not show how fast cells are actually breaking material down. This speed is called flux. The few studies that measured flux mostly found no change, the notes say. The notes give several examples. The best-designed human flux trial had 61 adults eat low- and standard-protein diets for four weeks each. It could detect a 15% change in blood-cell autophagy and found none. A five-day fasting-mimicking diet changed the static markers but not flux. Six months of calorie restriction did not change flux either. We have not seen the underlying studies. The popular idea that autophagy peaks after 24 to 72 hours of fasting comes largely from mouse experiments, according to the notes. They say mice burn roughly eight times more energy per unit of body weight than humans and start dying after about three days without food, so mice model human fasting poorly. We could not verify those figures. Animal results are not uniform either. In fruit flies, fasting 20 hours every other day extended lifespan by 13 to 18%, while 24-hour fasts shortened it, according to the notes. The notes also flag a conflict of interest: the senior author is said to hold a patent on a flux-measurement method, and the group produced several of the key flux studies the review covers. We could not check this against the paper's own disclosures, so it remains unverified. FOR YOU For readers weighing extended-fast claims, the practical reading is narrow. If the notes are accurate, a claim that a specific fast boosts cellular cleanup in people is not backed by the human flux data reviewed. That does not show fasting is useless or that it does nothing for health. It means this particular mechanism has not been demonstrated. The weakest point of this piece is that it rests entirely on secondhand notes. Fasting carries real risks for some people, so talk with your clinician before starting, stopping or changing a fasting regimen, especially an extended multi-day fast. Watch for more human trials that measure flux directly, ideally from groups without a stake in the measurement method. Source: Biochemical Society Transactions (Portland Press) THE ARISING · OCTOBER 18, 2026 PAGE 10