Research
Hormonal
Regular aerobic exercise reverses age-related endothelial progenitor cell (EPC) dysfunction by increasing both the number and migratory activity of EPCs in older adults.
If you are an older adult who has been sedentary, starting regular aerobic exercise can help restore your body's ability to repair blood vessels by increasing the number and activity of endothelial progenitor cells. This is a direct countermeasure to age-related vascular decline.
GoodSupportsHIGH confidence
regular aerobic exercise was recently reported to increase both the number and the migratory activity of EPCs in previously sedentary older men (88).
Why this rating
Cites specific human studies showing functional improvements, though the paper notes ongoing debate on reversibility.
Source
Mechanisms of Vascular Aging: New Perspectives
Zoltán Ungvári et al. · The Journals of Gerontology Series A · 2010
DOI 10.1093/gerona/glq113
narrative_reviewCited 526×
Read the paper DOI resolved against Crossref · corpus check 2026-06-10
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