Inaktivitet avler inaktivitet

Jeg fant ingen sofagris, så det får nøye seg med en sofahund. Foto: Patti Haskins

Skremmende forskningsfunn presentert i dagens utgave av Science Daily! Vår moderne livsstil leder til reduserte mengder mitokindrium i musklene, noe som igjen gjør det vanskeligere å trene, hvoretter vi faller inn i en nedadgående spiral. Takk og lov er det i det minste trapp i vårt nye hus, samt en planløsning som gjør at denne nyttes flittig.

Vi må etablere en ny samfunnsstruktur basert på New Urbanism og permakultur, hvor man bygger opp et finmasket nettverk av smarte koblinger som innbyr til fysisk aktivitet og mellommenneskelig kontakt.

Sakset fra Science Daily:

The researchers found the mice without the muscle AMPK genes had lower levels of mitochondria and an impaired ability for their muscles to take up glucose while they exercise.

"When you exercise you get more mitochondria growing in your muscle. If you don't exercise, the number of mitochondria goes down. By removing these genes we identified the key regulator of the mitochondria is the enzyme AMPK," said Steinberg.

Thousands of scientists around the world are working on AMPK but the McMaster team is the first to demonstrate its essential role in exercise. Their research appears in the current issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Steinberg said the findings are important for individuals who find it difficult to exercise, such as the obese, asthmatics and people in wheelchairs. Their inability to exercise may lead to other complications such as diabetes and heart disease.

The study, he thinks, has a message for couch potatoes. "As we remove activity from our lives due to emerging technology, the base level of fitness in the population is going down and that is reducing the mitochondria in people's muscles. This in turn makes it so much harder for people to start exercising."

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