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Longevity supplements › Urolithin A and Muscle › Studies

Animal study

In worms, rats and mice, urolithin A extended worm lifespan and improved exercise capacity

Ryu and colleagues · Nature medicine · 2016

Original title: Urolithin A induces mitophagy and prolongs lifespan in C. elegans and increases muscle function in rodents.

Under review. A person has not yet checked this summary against the paper. It is written from the PubMed abstract. Until a person checks it, search engines are asked not to list this page.

What the study found

Points to benefit

Urolithin A extended worm lifespan and kept worms moving. In two mouse models of age-related muscle decline and in young rats, it improved exercise capacity.

The study at a glance

Type of study
Animal study
Who or what was studied
Roundworms, plus young rats and mouse models of age-related muscle decline
What was tested
Urolithin A by mouth in worms and rodents
What it measured
Several kinds of outcomes
Who has a stake
No disclosure in PubMed
No disclosure in PubMed.
Journal
Nature medicine, 2016
Source
PubMed record 27400265. This page is based on the abstract only.

How much this study counts

  • –Done in animals. Results in animals often do not carry over to people.
  • •The PubMed record has no conflict-of-interest statement.
  • •Summarized from the PubMed abstract only. The full paper may hold details the abstract leaves out.

✓ Strength– Limit• Note

These points come from fixed rules about the type of study, its size and length, what it measured, and who has a stake. Every study on Digestery gets the same rules.

Where this study sits

Each dot is one on-topic paper on this question. Steps near the top answer the question more directly.

↑ Stronger evidence

  1. Trials in people: muscle strength and endurance

    0

    Not done yet. This is the step that would answer the question.

  2. Trials in people: other measures

    4

    3 mixed, 1 no difference

  3. Trials in people: lab tests or safety

    0

    None among the papers we read.

  4. Population studies

    0

    None among the papers we read.

  5. Blood levels and genes

    0

    None among the papers we read.

  6. Animals

    2

    2 benefit

    ↑ This study is the ringed dot

  7. Cells in a dish

    1

    1 no direction

↓ Weaker evidence

  • Points to benefit
  • Mixed
  • No difference
  • No direction
  • Points to harm

How it fits with the other research

The short answer to “Does urolithin A improve muscle health with age?”

Unclear: small trials, mixed results.

Confidence: very low. Based on 9 on-topic papers.

Read the full answer

Few other papers sit on the same step, so there is little to compare it with.

Other papers on the same step

See all 9 studies on this question

How this page was made

Label

First read of the abstract
Claude Sonnet
Independent second read
Claude Haiku
Differences settled
The two reads differed. The reviewer checked the abstract and kept the first read. Claude Opus 5.5.
Headline
Claude Sonnet, from the checked study record. A script checked its numbers and wording.
Numbers
Checked against the abstract by a script
“How much this study counts”
Fixed rules, the same for every study
Source check by a person
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