The humpback whale lives an average of 45 years, the savannah elephant can reach up to 70 years of life, that is, large animals live longer, correct? Not always! In the case of dogs, the opposite happens. That is, larger dogs end up not living as many years as smaller ones. In this way, today we will understand why this happens and explain why there are some types of dogs that live longer.
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By way of introduction, oxidative stress occurs due to an imbalance between the generation of oxidant compounds and the performance of antioxidant defense systems. That is, the generation of free radicals and/or reactive species results from oxygen metabolism.
And this doesn't just happen to our pets, the human body also goes through this biochemical process and that's why it's so important to eat food considered a source of antioxidants.
Parallel to this, recent research by a group of experts at Colgate University in Hamilton, New York, can claim that larger dogs have a shorter life expectancy because of this stress process oxidative.
With cells being destroyed with greater speed and intensity, premature aging is the result. This explains why a Chihuahua reaches 20 years of age, and a German Shepherd cannot live up to 10 years.
How did researchers prove this?
To prove the theory, 80 tissue samples were collected from newly killed puppies and elderly dogs, both large and small breeds. With that, they isolated the cells from these animals and cultivated them in vitro in the laboratory to carry out the study.
After analyses, cells from small dogs of both types achieved balanced energy and free radical production. On the other hand, in the large offspring, a change in the rate of oxygen free radicals was observed, the value skyrocketed and the antioxidants were not able to control them.
To understand the process in a simpler way, what happens is that the dogs of breeds big ones have fast metabolisms and therefore consume a much larger amount of energy than the small. In this way, cellular damage is caused and manages to manifest itself in a few years and shorten the lives of our companions.
