Dr. Rhonda Patrick

I was a chemist before I was a biologist.

So I had a previous... You had an evolution.

Yeah, yeah.

I was like lots and lots of chemistry and peptide synthesis and stuff.

And then I was... It's funny, as a chemistry major at UCSD...

there's only a little bit of biology requirements.

So I didn't really have vast experience in biology until I graduated from UCSD with my degree in chemistry, biochemistry, then decided I was kind of like, I don't know that this is really what I want.

I'm gonna like go work for a little bit.

And I went to the Salk Institute in La Jolla and started working in an aging lab.

And again, one of my first experiments was

What happens when you shut down the insulin signaling pathway in these little nematode worms that share a lot of homologous genes with humans, including the insulin receptor and IGF-1 receptor.

And it was so clear to me that when you...

decreased the insulin signaling in these little worms, you doubled their life expectancy.

Exactly.

Doubled it.

15 days to 30 days, boom, like that.

And their health span, I mean, you look at these worms and you get to know them after about 15 days.

You name them.

They're like, yeah, you name them.

And you see as they're reaching after a week, they start to move slower.