ISLAMABAD  – Early risers who exercise before breakfast can burn up to 20 percent more body fat than others who exercised after having something to eat, says a study.
Researchers sought to find out if the known benefits of exercising after an overnight fast were undermined by an increased appetite and eating more food later in the day.
A team from University of Northumbria at Newcastle asked 12 active men to perform a bout of treadmill exercise at 10 a.m., either after having breakfast or in a fasted state; having not eaten since the previous evening.
After their exercise, all participants were given a chocolate milkshake recovery drink. Later in the day, participants were provided with a pasta lunch which they were asked to eat until they felt “comfortably full”.
Their lunchtime consumption of energy and fat was assessed and calculated, taking into account the amount of energy and fat burned during the morning period.
The researchers, led by Emma Stevenson and Javier Gonzalez, found the ones who had exercised in the morning did not consume additional calories or experienced increased appetite during the day to compensate for their earlier activity.
It was also found that those who exercised in a fasted state managed to burn nearly 20 percent more fat than those who had taken breakfast before their workout. It showed that performing exercise on an empty stomach provides the most desirable outcome for fat loss.
Low protein diet may delay Alzheimer’s disease
Restricted protein diet may delay the process of Alzheimer`s disease, says an American study. Mice with many of the pathologies of Alzheimer`s disease showed fewer signs of the disease when given a protein-restricted diet supplemented with specific amino acids every other week for four months, reports Science Daily.
Mice at advanced stages of the disease were put on the new diet. They showed improved cognitive abilities over their non-dieting peers when their memory was tested using mazes.
In addition, fewer of their neurons contained abnormal levels of a damaged protein, called “tau,” which accumulates in the brains of Alzheimer`s patients according to the study published online by Aging Cellast month.
Upcoming studies by USCDavis School of Gerontology Professor Valter Longo, the study’s corresponding author, will attempt to determine whether humans respond similarly while simultaneously examining the effects of dietary restrictions on cancer, diabetes and cardiac disease.
Total darkness can cure `lazy eye`
Lazy eye - a condition in which one eye has weaker vision than the other - could be quickly cured by a spell in total darkness, a new study has found. Common in young children, a visual impairment known as amblyopia, causes blurry vision in the `lazy eye`.
It happens when the part of the brain responsible for deciphering signals from one eye does not work hard enough.
It is often treated with an eye patch over the `good` eye to force the other - or rather the relevant part of the brain - to work harder. Alternatively, eye drops are put in the good eye, again to force the child to `use` the other.
Now Canadian researchers have discovered that a spell of total darkness can quickly cure the condition, The Telegraph reported.
They put kittens with induced lazy eye into total darkness for 10 days, and found they recovered. Further examination suggested that the restoration of vision depends on the loss of neurofilaments that hold the visual system in place.
With those stabilising elements gone, the visual system becomes free to correct itself. Darkness therapy holds promise for the treatment of children with amblyopia, the researchers said, but don`t try this at home.
They think that the darkness must be absolute to work, with no stray light at any time. It is also important to address the original cause of the amblyopia first, and to ensure that a period of darkness will not harm an individual`s good eye.
The researchers are still working out just how much darkness is required, and for how long. Regardless, they said it is unlikely that a drug could ever adequately mimic the effects of darkness that they`ve seen.
“The advantage of a simple nonpharmacological sensory manipulation, such as a period of darkness, is that it may initiate changes in a constellation of molecules in a beneficial temporal order and in appropriate brain regions,” they said.