Advanced glycation end products (AGEs) are very harmful compounds which are created in your body when fat or protein combine with sugar in your bloodstream through the process of glycation. AGEs are also formed in foods when frying, grilling, roasting, barbecuing, toasting, or other methods when they are exposed to high temperatures.

AGEs and can cause many health problems and much of AGEs are the result of fried foods and heavily processed foods are especially high in AGEs. High carbohydrate foods have turn into sugar or glucose in our blood stream. If sugar isn’t cleared from the blood stream, the sugar molecules link with proteins and create AGEs.

The fact is your body can combat AGEs through antioxidant and enzymatic activities. However, when too many foods that create AGEs are consumed the body won’t be able to keep up with it and AGEs end up accumulating in the body.

Prolonged bouts of hyperglycemia or high blood sugar result in a large production of AGEs which damage the endothelial lining of the blood vessels, nerves, joints and organs. High levels of AGEs can increase inflammation and oxidative stress which increases the risk of diabetes, heart disease, strokes, kidney failure, liver problems, Alzheimer’s disease, and other health issues.

A 2015 study found that obese individuals with metabolic syndrome had higher AGE levels than otherwise healthy individuals.

According to a 2009 study on 559 older women, those with the highest levels of AGEs had the highest risk of dying from heart disease.

Other research has found similar connections between AGEs, blood sugar issues, and various serious health problems. Those with high blood sugar levels are at a higher risk of producing too many AGEs.

AGEs represent a potentially important cause of vascular dysfunction. As nitric oxide slows down its production with age, inflammation and damage to the arterial walls increases. The result of which may end in blood pressure problems, metabolic syndrome, kidney and liver problems, atherosclerosis and more.

The good news is nitric oxide is known to inhibit the formation of AGE’s and mitigates it effects. Nitric oxide has the ability to scavenge carbon-centered radicals, hydroxyl radical, and carbonyl compounds. Studies show that nitric oxide may be implicated in decreasing the damaging inflammatory effect of AGE’s and the oxidative damage it plays on arterial wall damage.

A Japanese study on renal failure, which tends to consist of elevated advanced glycation end products, found that nitric oxide had an anti-oxidant effect and lowered the oxidative stress resulting from advanced glycation end products.

The effect nitric oxide has on diminishing the harm caused by the aging and destructive molecule known as advanced glycation end products is one of the ways it is known for having an anti-aging effect on the body.