Dan Buettner | |
|---|---|
 Buettner in October 2010 | |
| Born | June 18, 1960[citation needed] |
| Nationality | American |
| Occupations | |
Dan Buettner (born June 18, 1960)[not verified in body] is an American National Geographic Fellow and New York Times-bestselling author. He is an explorer, educator, author, producer, storyteller and public speaker.[not verified in body] He co-produced an Emmy Award-winning documentary[not verified in body] and holds three Guinness records for endurance cycling.[not verified in body] Buettner is the founder of Blue Zones, LLC.
Dan Buettner was born on June 18, 1960, in Saint Paul, Minnesota.[citation needed] After graduating from the University of St. Thomas in 1983,[1] Buettner took a year to explore Spain before taking a job with National Public Radio in Washington, D.C., to recruit celebrity participation in a fund-raising croquet tournament with journalist George Plimpton.[citation needed]
Buettner graduated from the University of St. Thomas in 1983.[1] Soon thereafter he went to work for The Washington Post columnist Remar Sutton and Paris Review Editor George Plimpton to organize the National Public Radio's Celebrity Croquet Tournament.[2]
In 1986, Dan Buettner launched the first of several Guinness World Records for transcontinental cycling.[3] "Americastrek" traversed 15,536 miles (25,003 km), from Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, to Tierra del Fuego, Argentina; the 1990 "Sovietrek", where Dan was joined by his brother Steve,[4] followed the 45th parallel around the world and covered 12,888 miles (20,741 km), as Buettner recounted the trip in his book Sovietrek.[full citation needed] In 1992, in "Africatrek", the Buettner brothers team-cycled from Bizerte, Tunisia, to Cape Agulhas, South Africa, with cyclist Dr. Chip Thomas, covering 11,885 miles (19,127 km) over eight months.[citation needed]
In February 1995, Buettner developed a genre of exploration that enabled online audiences to direct teams of experts to solve mysteries. His MayaQuest [USA Today CITATION] expedition sought to help solve the mystery of the 9th century Maya Collapse. Carrying laptop computers and a newly demilitarized satellite dish, the expedition interacted with classrooms that helped determine exploration route and findings. Hamline University's Center for Global Environmental Education created a framework for schools to use the expedition as multi-disciplinary teaching themes. Both Africatrek and MayaQuest were adapted into educational computer games by MECC in the late 1990s.
In 1995, Buettner founded Earthtreks, Inc. to manage his expeditions.[citation needed] He sold the company to Classroom Connect in 1997 but continued to lead expeditions until 2002.[citation needed] His team retraced Darwin's route in the Galapagos and followed Marco Polo's trail on the Silk Road, explored the collapse of the Anasazi Civilization and traced the origins of Western Civilization.[citation needed]
When Buettner realized that adults were also following his expeditions, he approached National Geographic with the idea to research longevity hotspots and was given support to move forward.[citation needed] He then met with Robert Kane,[citation needed] as of 2016 the Director, Center on Aging, at the University of Minnesota,[5] who introduced him to demographers and scientists at the National Institute on Aging (NIA) in Washington, D.C.[citation needed] Buettner was awarded a grant from the National Institute of Aging.[citation needed] Previous research identified the longevity hotspots of Sardinia, Okinawa, and Loma Linda.[citation needed]
In 2003, Buettner began leading trips to these destinations while collaborating with a variety of experts, including anthropologists, historians, dietitians, and geneticists. His early trips focused on Sardinia, Italy; Okinawa, Japan; Monterrey, Nuevo Leon; and Loma Linda, California.[6]
Around the early 2000s (in order to validate the age of centenarians first reported in the AKEA study, see Deiana et al 1999 ), astrophysicist turned demographer Professor Michel Poulain and his team were investigating areas of extreme longevity in Italy. Their work eventually led to the introduction of the concept of Blue Zone by Poulain and colleagues as related to population experiencing exceptionally high longevity. Poulain identified, with Gianni Pes, Luca Deiana and colleagues, the first Blue Zone in Sardinia (with financial support from the US National Institute on Aging, subcontract with Duke University n. 03-SC-NIH-1027, from the MaxPlanck Institute for Demographic Research (MPIDR) in Rostock, Germany, and the Autonomous Region of Sardinia, Italy). This seminal research work caused a stir globally, when first presented at the 2000 IUSSP Montpellier conference as a short paper by Poulain, and even more when it appeared as a full publication in the journal of Experimental Gerontology in 2004 (Poulain et al 2004). Given the importance of the discovery, the Blue Zones concept early on in its development, attracted the attention, and support, of Buettner.
In 2003, Buettner formed Blue Zones LLC.[citation needed] Buettner reported on communities with increased longevity, identified as blue zones, in his cover story for National Geographic Magazine's November 2005 edition, "Secrets of Long Life."[7]
In 2006, under aegis of National Geographic, Buettner collaborated with Michel Poulain and Costa Rican demographer Dr. Luis Rosero-Bixby to identify a fourth longevity hotspot in the Nicoya Peninsula. In 2008, again working with Poulain, he found a fifth longevity hotspot on the Greek Island of Ikaria.[citation needed] In April 2008, Buettner released a book on his findings, The Blue Zones: Lessons for Living Longer From the People Who've Lived the Longest, through National Geographic Books. It resulted in interviews for Buettner on The Oprah Winfrey Show, The Dr. Oz Show, and Anderson Cooper 360.[citation needed]
In September 2009, Buettner gave a TED talk on the topic, titled "How to live to be 100+", which, as of this date,[when?] has over 4.6 million views.[8][third-party source needed] In October 2010, he released the book Thrive: Finding Happiness the Blue Zones Way, largely based on research taking a data-based approach to identify the statistically happiest regions of the happiest countries on Earth.[according to whom?] He argues that creating lasting happiness is only achievable through optimizing the social and physical environments.[9]
In April 2015, Buettner published The Blue Zones Solution: Eating and Living Like the World's Healthiest People, which listed Ikaria (in Greece), Okinawa (Japan), Sardinia (Italy), Loma Linda (California), and Costa Rica as the places with top longevity.[10] It became a New York Times Best Seller.[11] The book was featured on the cover of Parade, and Buettner was interviewed extensively on national media.[citation needed]
In 2019, Buettner and National Geographic photographer David McLain revisited all of the Blue Zones to study diet; based on this, Buettner and Mclain wrote Blue Zones Kitchen.[full citation needed][citation needed] In 2020, Blue Zones LLC was acquired by Adventist Health.[12]
In 2008, inspired by Finland's North Karelia Project,[13][third-party source needed] Buettner designed a plan to apply his Blue Zones principles to an American town.[citation needed] He auditioned five cities and chose Albert Lea, Minnesota, for the AARP/Blue Zones Vitality Project, where he believed the key to success involved focusing on the ecology of health—creating a healthy environment rather than relying on individual behaviors.[citation needed]
Walter Willett, chair of the department of nutrition at the Harvard School of Public Health, found the results[clarification needed] "stunning".[14] As a whole, the community showed an 80% increase in walking and biking; 49% decrease in city worker's healthcare claims, and 4% reduction in smoking.[citation needed] The community shed 12,000 pounds, walked 75 million steps, and added three years to their average life expectancy.[citation needed] City officials reported a 40% drop in health care costs.[citation needed]
In 2010, Buettner partnered with Healthways, a global health and well-being company, to scale the Blue Zones city work under the rubric of Blue Zones Projects.[15][third-party source needed] The Blue Zones Project team partnered with Beach Cities Health District in Southern California to apply Blue Zone principles to three California communities—Redondo Beach, Hermosa Beach, and Manhattan Beach. Their work occasioned the lowering of BMI by 14% and smoking by 30%, as well as increasing healthy eating and exercise.[16]
In 2011, the Blue Zones Project joined forces with Wellmark Blue Cross and Blue Shield to deliver the Blue Zones Project across the State of Iowa as the cornerstone of the Governor's Healthiest State Initiative and is at work in 18 cities there to effect change.[citation needed] In 2013, projects began in Fort Worth, Texas, and in Hawaii.[where?][17][18][third-party source needed]
In 2014, work began in Naples, Florida; South Bend, Indiana; and Klamath Falls, Oregon.[15][third-party source needed] In 2018, Klamath Falls was recognized by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) as the "Culture of Health" prize winner[19]
Buettner and American model Cheryl Tiegs ended a relationship on January 1, 2009.[24]
