SHR

Generally speaking, with age comes a natural loss of muscle mass and function that is owed in no small part to a reduction in physical activity. This may be because protein metabolism is greatly influenced by the contractile activity of skeletal muscle, and it has been shown that muscular disuse results in a reduction in muscle protein synthesis (MPS) both after a meal and when in the fasting state. Even modest reductions in muscular loading through step‐reduction (SR; <1500 steps/day) for 2-weeks has been shown to reduce MPS in older adults, further supporting the notion that sedentariness plays a large role in the anabolic resistance of aging. Somewhat obviously, resistance training (RT) is the foundation of any intervention that seeks to counteract muscle and strength loss, and there is no shortage of evidence showing older individuals to benefit. However, many interventions use high-load programs that may not always be feasible for...

Metabolically healthy obese – key protective factors Obesity is commonly accompanied by numerous comorbidities (metabolic syndrome) that involve insulin resistance (IR), type-2 diabetes (T2D), hypertension, dyslipidemia, cardiovascular diseases, and a systemic inflammatory state. However, not all obese adults have these conditions and there are in fact obese individuals who have less visceral fat and adverse health complications than would be expected, a condition that has been termed metabolically healthy obesity (MHO). Why are these people different? That is the central question answered by Goncalves et al, who reviewed the protective metabolic, genetic, and etiological factors of MHO that represent between 10% and 45% of the adult obese population. It turns out that everything is traceable to one seminal factor – lower visceral fat, which is what ultimately causes IR and the detrimental inflammatory and hormonal profile that contributes to increased risk for cardiovascular disease. Whether some individuals carry genetic predisposition to MHO,...

Nine weeks of dedicated for the elderly to see progress If you train long enough, your bound to build muscle eventually. Just how long was recently investigated by researchers from Brazil who recruited elderly men and women to undergo a 10-week resistance training (RT) program with workouts twice per week, no structured physical activity (control). Initially, the subjects warmed-up in a stationary bicycle for five minutes. Afterwards, subjects performed 4 sets x 10 repetitions with a 1-min rest interval between sets in a 45° leg press machine (G3-PL70 MATRIX, São Paulo, Brazil). In the first five weeks of training the exercise intensity was set at 70% 1-RM, based on the pre-test values; for the last five weeks, exercise intensity was increased to 80% of the re-tested 1-RM (assessed at the middle of the RT period). The range of motion at the knee joint during the leg-press was set to ~ 90°....

Vitamin B12 (also called cobalamin) deficiency affects roughly 6% of adults aged 70+ years and is a concern frequently attributable to gastric atrophy that leads to malabsorption. B12 is found primarily in animal products bound to the protein and must be freed by the digestive action of our stomach acid and enzymes. Once freed from the protein, B12 is immediately bound to an R protein within the gastric juice that protects it from bacterial use. Upon entering the small intestine, the B12 is released from the R protein and binds to intrinsic factor (IF) that was synthesized within the stomach but escapes digestion. This B12-IF complex travels through the small intestine to interact with receptors that allow for the absorption of B12. Gastric atrophy affects the early steps of this process by limiting protein digestion and/or the production of IF. Full-blown B12 deficiency leads to numerous neurologic and cognitive disturbances as...