X-Message-Number: 8368
Date: Mon, 14 Jul 1997 07:23:22 -0700 (PDT)
From: Doug Skrecky <>
Subject: 12'th update on fly longevity experiments 

    This is the twelfth update on my fly experiments. The most recent
 results are as follows:

 Third Run                  Survival
 Supplement            DAY 17 DAY 36 DAY 48
 Control                64%    14%     0%
 Activated charcoal     87     31     15
 Amchoor                73     42      8
 Angelica               56     18      0
 Anise                  45     43     19
 Bay                    69      0      0
 Beet                   62      0      0
 Betaine HCL            82     27      0
 Carrot                 40      0      0
 Celery seed            90      0      0
 Citrus bioflavonoids   65      5      0
 Comfrey                88      0      0
 Dill seed              82      0      0
 Green pea              76      8      0
 Hydroxycitric acid     47      0      0
 Kelp                   64      7     12
 Malt                   83     34     18
 Melatonin              54     31      6
 Melatonin 2X           70     29      6
 Melatonin 4X           65      6      0
 Nicotinamide 6X        28      0      0
 Paprika                69     43     29
 Para-aminobenzoic acid 82     17     11
 Purple yam             92     58      8
 Rosehip                88      6      6
 Sage                   66     19      7
 Sage 2X                67      0      0
 Sage 4X                94      0      0
 Silica                 88      7      0
 Spinach                40     20      0
 Tumerin                84      0      0

    Currently the highest survival is in the bottle containing
 paprika(29), followed by anise(19), malt(18), and activated charcoal(15).
 Purple yam has fallen by the wayside with a dramatic fall in survival
 from 58% to just 8%. The very low initial mortality from the day 17
 census, I interpret as indicating that purple yam is probably offering
 good protection against pathogens derived originally from the infected
 breeding bottles used to start run #3. However the rapid subsequent fall
 off in survival indicates that purple yam probably does not slow fly
 aging. The situation is quite different for paprika, which did not
 initially offer any advantage, yet the fall off in survival after the
 first census has been quite modest from 69%, to 43%, to the current 29%.
 I interpret this as a genuine anti-aging effect.
    Low dose sage, with a 7% survival has again outlasted the control
 bottle, as it did in the second run, when it bested 23 other bottles to
 offer the best survival. I suspect that this is due to the bactericidal
 action of this spice. The rapid fall off in survival from higher doses of
 sage may be due to thujone poisoning. I do not expect sage offers much if
 any antiaging action.
    The increase from 7 to 12% survival in the kelp bottle is anomalous.
 This is due to the appearance of 2 extra small flies in this bottle. It
 is just possible that these may be offspring that somehow survived the
 taurine larvicide I mix with the fly medium. The "original" 14 flies are
 all dead.
    In order to accelerate my experiments I had decided to "age" the flies
 I use in my longevity experiments. For the 4'th run I originally
 transferred a large number of flies from the breeding bottles to
 "holding" bottles containing taurine larvicide. After these reached
 "middle age" after a month I had planned to use them to start the next
 run. Unfortunately this is not going to happen. To prevent early
 mortality I decided to add either purple yam or high dose sage to the
 holding bottles. I flipped a coin and unfortunately chose sage. The
 slaughter was immense! The flies in the holding bottles rapidly followed
 their brothers in the sage 4X bottle from run #3 to early graves. I was
 struck once again by how inconvenient it is that medium 4-24 does not
 incorporate an effective bactericide.
    After my original plan for run #4 was blown up, I decided to
 concentrate on investgating bactericides for this run. The few flies I
 could get from the old diseased breeding bottles I have used to initiate
 run #4 as follows:

 Run #4
 Control
 bactine 1%
 bactine 4X 4%
 garlic 500 mg/100 ml
 garlic 4X 2000 mg/100 ml
 KCL 500
 KCL 4X 2000
 mint listerine 25%
 mint listerine 4X 100%
 paprika 500
 paprika 4X 2000
 pectin 2000
 plax 25%
 plax 4X 100%
 purple yam 500
 purple yam 4X 2000
 salt 500
 salt 4X 2000
 sterisol 25%
 sterisol 4X 100%
 viadent 25%
 viadent 4X 100%
 water reduced 50%

    The bactericial liquids bactine, mint listerine, plax, sterisol and
 viadent were used to replace part or all of the water used in the medium.
 I also reduced the amount of water used by 50% in one bottle to test
 whether depriving bacteria of some of their water would be helpful. To my
 knowledge this is the first longevity test of water restriction in any
 animal species to date. I included pectin because by accident I found
 that flies prefer zero calorie non-sweetened pectin solutions over wine
 or any other liquid. I have no idea why flies like pectin or even how
 they know they like it. I presume pectin must have a smell that flies can
 detect, but which humans can not.
    The only item being tested which does not appear to offer any
 bactericial effects is paprika. However the results from run #3 were so
 intriguing that I could not wait till later to test paprika again. Run #4
 would have been larger (only 23 bottles this time), but I ran out of
 flies from the old breeding bottles. Based on the results from run #4 I
 hope to eliminate or at least greatly reduce the confounding effects of
 pathogens on fly longevity.

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