About SAAM and OFAS
Founded 57 years ago, OFAS (the Orentreich Foundation for the Advancement of Science) is dedicated to biomedical research to prevent, halt, or reverse those disorders that decrease the quality or length of life. In the past 25 years, we have investigated a promising means of achieving this: a diet low in sulfur amino acids. During this time, we have seen how a low amino-acid diet can increase lifespan and delay onset of age-related diseases; examined the interplay of methionine and cysteine, the two amino acids which contain sulfur; and sought to understand the mechanisms by which these two sulfur amino-acids affect so many aspects of health.
Mission
In the United States the average person consumes SAA at levels far in excess of the Estimated Average Requirement.
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We want to educate the public on the health benefits of a low SAA diet while providing a tool to measure SAA intake and offer online expert advice, meal plans and recipes.
The SAAM diet will improve metabolism, i.e., improve insulin sensitivity which will help ameliorate some forms of diabetes, obesity, and aging; if the results are comparable to what has been observed in animal models and human dietary studies.
The goal of our research is to develop a dietary system–the sulfur amino acid method or SAAM–that improves health and lifespan by reducing such age-related diseases as diabetes, obesity, heart disease and possibly cancer. The benefits of this system will also regulate body fat, initiate weight loss, and increase energy.
Vision
Given the potential of the sulfur amino acid method (SAAM) to increase both healthspan and lifespan, we want to provide the public with accurate and timely information so that anyone can incorporate SAAM into their lives.
With this app we want to help people understand what an SAA restricted diet looks like: with up-to-date, evidence-based information. It’s a guide on how to adopt a low SAA lifestyle which will in turn improve overall health and longevity.
Because animal proteins contain higher amounts of SAA, SAAM diets consist largely of plant-based foods. A plant centered diet lowers the environmental impact of food production. A SAAM diet will not only promote our own health and longevity, but the health and longevity of our planet.
HISTORY
Dr. Norman Orentreich founded the Orentreich Foundation for the Advancement of Science, Inc. in 1961 to study aging. His interest in aging began while he was a student at City College in Manhattan. He was fascinated by studies of wound healing in young and old soldiers during WWI which showed that young soldiers healed faster. He recognized that in order to study aging it would be necessary to have a means by which biological age could be measured. This led him to study a biomarker known as DHEA, an important pre-hormone produced by the adrenal glands, which rises and falls over a person’s lifetime.
When Dr. Orentreich learned about research which demonstrated that a diet severely restricted in calories extended lifespan in laboratory animals and delayed the appearance of many age-related diseases, he was intrigued and asked himself whether it was the reduction of calories, or the reduction of some specific nutritional component in the diet, that
contributed to lifespan extension.
His investigations led him to discover that restricting one of the amino acids known as methionine resulted in lifespan extension in laboratory animals similar to that seen with calorie restriction. This led to research exploring the mechanisms by which methionine restriction plays an important part in improving health and extending life span. Amino acids are the building blocks of proteins, and essential amino acids such as methionine are those that must be ingested since the body cannot synthesize them.
The beneficial impacts of SAA restricted diets in these studies included life span extension, delayed signs of aging, reductions in body weight and adiposity, enhanced insulin resistance, and positive changes in blood biomarkers including insulin, glucose, leptin, and adiponectin.
Dr Norman Orentreich’s son, Dr David Orentreich, continued this research with a group of scientists at OFAS. After decades of seeing amazing results in clinical research, they realized it is time to share this information with the public. They started developing an app where you can measure and therefore limit your SAA intake, preventing disease and prolonging life!