Exposure to Green Nature's Benefits

"Our study shows that being near green space caused some biological or molecular changes that can be detected in our blood."

"[Biological age] really depends on what we do daily [including what we eat and how physically active we are]."

Lifang Hou, preventive medicine professor, Feinberg School of Medicine, Northwestern University

"We know the benefits of green space in reducing premature mortality."

"This study explains how this could happen by describing how green spaces can modify how genes are expressed."

David Rojas-Rueda, epidemiology professor, Colorado State University

"This is one of the first studies that really kind of demonstrates how exposure to nature, living in greener areas, may get under our skin and lead to these kinds of fundamental changes to these biomarkers of aging."

"We have this vegetation data, but it tells us very little about what the active ingredients in nature are that influence health. It just tells you the quantity of vegetation in a given area around your home."

"We need to start changing our perspective on green space and really viewing it as an essential piece of infrastructure, just the same as sewer systems and garbage collection."

"This is something that we require as human beings to thrive, to be healthy."

Peter James, environmental epidemiologist, T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Harvard

According to a study published recently in the journal Science Advances, living near heavily green spaces could be a great aid in allowing us to live longer, healthier lives. The study suggests that long-term exposure to greenery where you live can led to adding 2.5 years to your life on average. The result of the paper's conclusions adds to existing knowledge of health benefits gained by living around greenery.

The study sheds increased light on how nature can affect our bodies. Long-term exposure to surrounding green spaces and how that affected biological aging among a group of over 900 people in four U.S. cities formed the basis of the research. The researchers compared age-related biological alterations in the study participants over a 20-year period against data on green spaces near where those participants live in their goal to explore the association between long-term green benefits exposure and aging.

With the use of blood DNA, the researchers were enabled to measure biological age at a molecular level through analyzing small changes in how genes related to the aging process work, explained Dr. Hou. Should an individual's biological age, sped up or slowed down depending on how they live, be seen as older than their chronological age, they could be at higher risk for developing age-related conditions like cancer, cardiovascular disease or Alzheimer's, explained Dr. Hou.

 

The study emphasized that not only is it about what each individual actively engages in for their own health, but as well their neighbourhoods and communities. Satellite imaging was used by the researchers to assess green spaces, applying a widely-accepted measure of quantifying vegetation, explained the study's lead author, Kyeez Kim, a post-doctoral researcher at the Feinberg School of Medicine, at Northwestern University. Major parks were also identified close to participants' homes.

That helped to identify the location and quantity of plant life; the approach however, fails to provide details regarding the type of vegetation -- whether an area is a golf course or a forested nature trail -- or quality of green space. Greater details of the green spaces under study and what people might be engaged in within those landscapes, is critical, according to Karen Seto, director of the Hixon Center for Urban Ecology at the Yale School of the Environment.

"Because we don't know what type of green space it is, I think for cities, they don't know is it sufficient just to plant a bunch of street trees?" Other questions were left unanswered by the study; as for example, why the rate of biological aging appeared different across race, gender and socioeconomic status. Black people, the researchers observed, who had more access to green space realized only an advance of a single year younger in biological age in comparison with the study's average of 2.5 years.

The results of the study even so, are meant to encourage people to think more about their surroundings, when making healthy living decisions, along with observance of a healthy diet, adequate sleep and daily exercise, urged Dr. Hou. And, added Dr. James, the study should also serve as motivation for policymakers to incorporate nature into people's daily lives. More parks and better access to community parks in dense neighbourhoods, for a start.