WIKIMEDIA, MASURIn 2014, researchers published puzzling results that went against a heap of data on the effects of calorie restriction on lifespan: when put on a diet, the yeast lived no longer than yeast given the normal amount of food. As ScienceNews reported back then, no one could quite explain the results. Perhaps yeast “drown” in the microfluidics chamber in which they were grown, or they become stunted, or it’s some other growth condition affecting their longevity, scientists speculated.
This week, an independent group of researchers offered up yet another possibility: the cells just weren’t there to be counted. The team tested calorie restriction on its own microfluidics device and found that yeast did indeed live longer as nutrients were reduced.
“One possible explanation for this discrepancy is the very low retention rate of the cells in [the first] device,” Lidong Qin of Houston Methodist Research Institute and his colleagues wrote in their report, published July 13 in PNAS. In other words, “The previous study’s machine probably prematurely washed away many of the mother cells, so their late-life divisions weren’t counted,” according to ScienceNews this week.
Even though the yeast cells in the earlier story weren’t retained by the microfluidics platform, they were included ...
