Beta Alanine is a naturally occuring amino acid. It is the limiting factor within the body when it comes to making carnosine. Beta Alanine is combined with histidine in the body to create carnosine. Part of the secret to the anti aging approach is to identify those hormones and other nutrients that decline with age. Once identified, we must find methods to replace or restore them. L Carnosine is a depeptide of the amino acids beta alanine and histidine. Carnosine is highly concentrated in muscles and brain tissue. Carnosine is also one of those depeptides that declines with age around 63% from age 10 to age 70, and thus contributes to the aging process. The good news is that it is easy to restore, by supplementing the proper dosage of beta alanine to the diet.
Numerous benefits have been attributed to the presence of ample carnosine in the body:

• Carnosine is an antioxidant and plays an important role in our overall health
• Studies on Carnosine show that it can protect the brain from plaque, a cause of Alzheimer’s disease.
• Studies on Carnosine show that it protects DNA better than any other nutrient
• Carnosine has the unique ability to turn old cells into young and healthy cells!
• Carnosine is known to accelerate wound healing through repair of connective tissue
• Carnosine helps to prevent the build up of lactic acid in our muscles

The supplementation of Beta Alanine can restore intramuscular levels of carnosine within 4 weeks or so. Aging is associated with damage to cellular proteins, resulting in inter- and intra-molecular cross-linking. Carnosine protects cellular proteins from this metabolic damage in at least two ways. As an antioxidant, carnosine prevents the formation of oxidized sugars, or glycosyl radicals, also called advanced glycosylation end products (AGEs). Second, carnosine bonds with potentially harmful carbonyl groups that attack and bind with proteins imbedded in the cellular membrane, and neutralizes them. Both of these processes have important applications for anti-aging therapy, in that carnosine not only prevents damaging cross-links from forming, it also eliminates cross-links that have previously formed, therefore restoring normal membrane function

Good for muscles: Muscle strength and mass typically decline with age, and the incidence of several neuromuscular diseases (e.g., amyotrophic lateral sclerosis [ALS], myasthenia gravis, polymyositis, drug-induced myopathies, late-onset mitochondrial myopathy) increases with age. Carnosine concentration in muscle declines with age, and the decline of carnosine has been proposed as one of the causes of age-related decline in muscle strength and mass, as well as a cause of specific neuromuscular diseases such as ALS or polymyositis.

Supplementing with beta alanine can dramatically increase muscle carnosine levels. Muscle carnosine concentrations, in turn, relate directly to muscle performance. In a study of 11 healthy males, Japanese scientists found that carnosine not only prevents lactic acid buildup in high-intensity exercise, resulting in reduced fatigue and muscle pain, but that those with the highest concentrations of carnosine had the best performance in terms of strength, speed and endurance

Most interesting: Cell Senescence. Cells regenerate themselves by dividing to form a pair of new cells. In 1961, scientist L. Hayflick discovered that cells eventually reach a limit beyond which they cannot continue to divide properly. (Hayflick L et al., 1961; Hayflick L, 1965). Hayflick demonstrated that cultured human fibroblasts (connective tissue cells) can divide only about 60 to 80 times. When a cell reaches this “Hayflick Limit” it enters into a twilight state called cellular senescence. Senescent cells are very much alive, but they are distorted in both form and function.

As the maker of the Time Machine, we have an interest in possibly increasing the average lifespan of a human beyond 100 years, as a matter of routine. Therefore, we have a big interest in cell senescence. Carnosine is the only nutrient that has shown the remarkable ability to increase cell senenscence dramatically.

Carnosine addresses the biochemical paradox of life: The elements that make and give life, meaning oxygen, glucose, lipids, proteins, and trace metals, also destroy life in ways that are inhibited by carnosine. Carnosine protects against those destructive processes through amazing antioxidant, anti-glycating, aldehyde quenching and metal chelating actions (Quinn PJ et al., 1992; Hipkiss AR, Preston JE et al., 1998). Our bodies are literally made of various structures of proteins, and carnosine protects these proteins.

These interrelated protein modifications include oxidation, carbonylation, cross-linking, glycation and advanced glycation endproduct (AGE) formation. They figure prominently not only in the processes of aging but also in those familiar signs such as skin wrinkling, cataracts and neurodegeneration. Studies show that carnosine is effective against all these forms of undesireable protein modification.

As an antioxidant, carnosine inhibits the dreaded hydroxyl radical, as well as superoxide, singlet oxygen and the peroxyl radical. Surprisingly, carnosine is the only antioxidant to significantly protect chromosomes from oxidative damage due to 90% oxygen exposure.

Carnosine’s ability to rejuvenate connective tissue cells may explain its beneficial effects on wound healing. In addition, skin aging is bound up with protein modification. Damaged proteins accumulate and cross-link in the skin, causing wrinkles and loss of elasticity. In the lens of the eye, protein cross-linking is part of cataract formation. Carnosine eye drops have been shown to delay vision senescence in humans, being effective in 100% of cases of primary senile cataract and 80% of cases of mature senile cataract (Wang AM et al., 2000).

Since the Time Machine is designed to combat the aging process, the addition of Beta Alanine, as a method of increasing carnosine is essential to the quality of life. No one is excited about living well past age 100, unless we can feel good. Preventing the decline of carnosine, via Beta Alanine supplementation makes the Time Machine one of the most effective weapons against aging that has every been produced.