The Science Behind Why Some Women Look Young Forever

You know how there are some women who not only look good for their age, they look like they made a deal with some kind of mystery power to look at least 10 years younger than they really are? You kind of wonder if they have some painting hidden away somewhere that’s rapidly aging for them.

What’s their secret ritual anyway — do they do ridiculous things like taking daily milk baths, or workout using miniature ponies as weights?

What are they doing and how can I get me some?

A recent study from Harvard University, 23andMe, and Olay have come up with a new theory that suggests that someone who looks scarily great for their age has less to do with weird beauty techniques, or any deals with the underworld to just having great genes including the Methuselah genes.

For people who possess the Methuselah gene have extra protection against the effects of smoking, eating too many bad-for-you foods, and not working out enough. Methuselah gene holders even seem to be less susceptible to the onset of age-related diseases such as heart disease and type 2 diabetes.

Okay but what about those women who don't just look good on the inside, but look as though time has stopped on the outside?

Olay's breakthrough Multi-Decade and Ethnicity (MDE) study revealed some of the traits that women (who look a lot younger than they are) share. The MDE study (which was started in 2012) studies women in nearly every decade of their lives — from their 20s to their 70s and various ethnicities including Caucasian, African, Hispanic, and Asian.

The study is led by Dr. Alexa Kimball, Professor of Dermatology, Harvard Medical School/Massachusetts General Hospital, and other scientific and analytical research partners in the fields of system biology, skin biology, and 3-D imaging and hormone mapping.

In other words, there are some very serious credentials behind this study, so serious in fact, that how we age in the future will be affected.

With the addition of 23andMe, the leading personal genetics company, the MDE study was able to dig deeper into genes linked to skin aging and their biological variability with different ethnicities.

One of the things that the study has identified is an unique fingerprint among exceptional skin agers comprised of around 2,000 genes (including the Methuselah gene) which may hold the key to successful aging.

According to the study, the Methuselah gene is found in one fifth of black Americans and only in one in ten white Americans. 

So when someone who looks much younger than their years is asked how they do it and they respond they just have good genes, they're probably right.