 Advances in modern medicine, our life expectancy is increasing. But how can we age well? And what does that even mean? Dr. Yitzke Tetechkova's research into the aging process has led her to develop five pillars of good health and longevity. She shares her research through talks in the community to encourage and empower people to take responsibility for their own aging process. I research aging and I lead aging while public talks here at the Open University. The talks are structured around five pillars for aging well, nutrition, hydration, physical activity, social and cognitive stimulation. How much do you think we can influence the way in which we age? So it's not the one thing that will make us age well. It will be a combination of things that are the right things for us. So this is where our ownership of our health care is so important because we can only tell our doctor how we feel, how the medication they prescribe makes us feel. So then they can really help us to get well, get better and stay well and age well. I read about the impact of kind of social dynamics and community for aging, which I found really kind of surprising in eyeopening. Our brain fires up hugely and much more when we see people in person that when we, for example, see them online on a screen. So human connections are much more than just an image. It's a smell, it's chemistry that we sometimes don't even understand. But all that fires our brain and when brain gets stimulated, it's likely to function better for longer. When people discover the five pillars of aging well, what do you think surprises people the most? It's hydration. When we are dehydrated, our body doesn't perform optimally. How many people have been coming to your talks and engaging with this research? So since we started here at the OU, actually here in the library in September 2019, we had over 35,000 people engaging with the talks, with the recorded materials and with accompanying materials such as open-land articles that we could produce with colleagues and people with lived experience. Dr Jitka's work is full of surprises. So remember, drink lots of water and make lots of friends. If you would like to find out more about research projects or courses at the Open University, go to open.ac.uk.