Elysabethe Brown
News Editor
Dr. James Smoliga, assistant professor in health and physical education, was recently filmed by NHK Japanese Public Television. According to Dr. Smoliga, the television station is basically the equivalent to America’s PBS. So how did a Marywood University professor end up appearing on the airwaves of about 15 million Japanese homes?
The television station is doing a documentary on the science of aging and how to prevent aging from happening. Coincidentally Dr. James Smoliga is doing research on resveratrol, which may help memory and cardiovascular fitness in secondary adults. He has even presented at the first resveratrol conference in Copenhagen this past September.
The television station was interested in how resveratrol and other physiological interventions could affect aging, and sought universities performing interesting research in this field.
The documentary will also feature research taking place at MIT, University of Pennsylvania, Albert Einstein University, and the University of Wisconsin.
The television crew read about Dr. Smoliga’s research online and contacted him. “There are very few laboratories examining the effects of resveratrol supplementation in people, especially otherwise healthy people,” Dr.Smoliga said.
Dr. Smoliga explained that they are currently examining the effects of a resveratrol supplement called Vindure on cardiovascular health, memory, body composition, and blood markers of inflammation in healthy people from the ages of 45-75. Participants in the experiment will either receive a resveratrol supplement, which has as much resveratrol as 100 glasses of wine, or a placebo. However, they do not know what they receive. They will take this for about a month and then return to the lab to be retested to see if their health has improved.
“This was an ideal project for the TV station to put in their documentary, as we will be able to tell if resveratrol may make people healthier and perhaps prevent the effects of aging.”Dr.Smoliga said.
According to Dr. Smoliga, the camera crew will be returning in December to follow-up with all of the participants they filmed to see if their health improved after taking resveratrol.
“[Working with the crew] was a great experience and very unique. They asked lots of questions, which indicated they had a sincere interest in understanding what was happening and why we were doing it, and aimed to make the best documentary possible.” Dr.Smoglia said.
