Three easy habits you can start tomorrow to reverse ageing, according to a scientist

There is a whole industry dedicated to quick fixes and easy solutions to reversing the ageing process.

However, in the past few years, there's been a shift in focus when talking about ageing.

It's no longer just talking about someone's physical age as it would appear on their birth certificate, but their biological age, which comes from their health and how well their body functions.

As people look for easy solutions to turn back the inner clock, scientist Dr Nichola Conlon tells 9honey there are three things anyone can do, starting tomorrow, to help live a fuller and healthier life.

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But before that, Conlon explains why looking at biological age over physical age is the way forward.

"[Ageing has been] one of those things that we have to live with and accept and age gracefully, but there's actually nothing graceful about ageing," the molecular biologist tells 9honey in London.

"When you look at the fundamentals of it, it robs us of not only the way we look, the way we feel, our independence, but now the key shift is that it has been shown there's something we can do about this.

"There's actually things that we can do to reverse the rate that we're ageing at a cellular level, so that our bodies can continue being able to repair themselves, being able to recover from things, being more resilient like we did when we were younger.

"I think that's the key change, there's a choice."

Conlon says while some people might equate biohacking with trying to find the fountain of youth, she says that's not the case – it's not about turning back the clock or becoming immortal, it's about living in good health for as long as possible.

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"A woman in the UK, I'm not sure on the stats of Australia are, is expected to live for 83 years but her health span is expected to only be 64 years," she says.

"So that's a big chunk of time in between where she will have multiple chronic age-related diseases.

"The idea is, can we maybe push that health span up to, like, age 80, for example?

"Then you're living your life, doing everything you want to do, in good health, then you've only got a couple of years at the end where you have poor health, as opposed to what we have now.

"So I think it's actually about reframing it in: this is all about how well we are, as opposed to living forever."

So, how can you live longer and healthier with three simple tweaks to your day?

1. Eat more plant variety

Conlon says if you're looking at your diet, her key tip is to eat more plant variety.

"Increase the number of plants in your diet, aiming for around 30 different plants each week," she advises.

"Now this doesn't mean becoming vegan, it just means increasing the diversity. So this can be fruit, veg, nuts, seeds etc, anything from a plant.

"It is incredibly beneficial for lowering inflammation across the entire body and reversing biological age."

Conlon also says switching from a highly processed diet to a Mediterranean diet can reduce your biological age by three years in just eight weeks.

2. Get proper sleep

The Newcastle-based podcaster says while this is a boring one, there's a reason evolution hasn't gotten rid of the need for this.

"It's so fundamentally important," she stresses

"We see that people that do shift work, people that are not getting the required amount of sleep or having poor quality sleep, don't live as long, don't live as healthy and have multiple age-related diseases that start earlier.

"So sleep, please try ... It's super important."

3. Be surrounded by good relationships

Conlon agrees that her third tip might be a surprise one for many but there are studies to prove the significance "a sense of community" provides.

"There was a study of, I think, over 700 different adults that looked at what was the biggest thing that had the most impact on how well they aged, and the biggest thing was actually having meaningful relationships and connections, so being surrounded by a good community and not being lonely."

Now, get ready for part two of the surprise – the health implications loneliness can have on people.

"Loneliness is just as bad as smoking 15 cigarettes a day," Conlon says.

"So just having a good little group of friends - it doesn't have to be huge - but having a group of friends, having good relationships, having that sense of community, is actually incredibly beneficial."

How ageing might change in the future

Conlon says there is a "highly controversial" change we may see in the future, given all the research into age-related illnesses currently taking place.

"Modern medicine at the moment is very reactive. We wait 'til we get a disease and then we try to do something about it," she says.

"Targeting ageing is much more preventative. It is about making sure we are slowing cellular ageing before the appearance of age-related diseases even happen. So this is a very different way of practising modern medicine.

"For example, looking at drug development, in order for a drug to come to market, it has to treat a specific disease. Now, ageing itself is not classified as a disease.

"So even at the moment, even though all this amazing research is happening, we cannot actually develop a drug to treat ageing because it's not a disease.

"This means that if we do really want to target ageing, we need to actually reclassify it almost.

"So there's a lot of talk now, 'Well, maybe if ageing is the root cause [of certain illnesses], then do we look at ageing as a disease?' That's highly controversial but there's a lot of things, fundamental ways our societies and systems are set up, that are going to need rethinking in order to integrate this new knowledge into practice."

So while the scientific world mulls over how the research might impact the future, it might be easier to get a heads start with more plant varieties, regular sleep patterns and more time spent with good friends.

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