A Hormone that can mimic a good workout

No sweat required. A hormone that surges during exercise may confer some of the benefits of a workout, when levels are artificially boosted.

The hormone is identical in mice and humans and promotes the development of a type of energy-burning fat - a discovery that could be key to treating obesity and diabetes.

A protein known as PGC1-alpha mediates many of the benefits of exercise, such as resistance to metabolic diseases.

To find out more, a team from the Dana Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, analysed factors secreted by muscle and regulated by PGC1-alpha.

One of these factors turned out to be a new hormone which had gone unnoticed because it is hidden within a complex molecule.

Further study showed that levels of that hormone jumped in mice and humans after bouts of exercise.

When the hormone was added to mouse subcutaneous white fat cells at an early stage of development, it made the cells more likely to become "beige" fat cells. These, like brown fat, are equipped to burn body fuel to generate heat.

"The hormone carries a message from muscle to fat tissue," says lead author Pontus Bostrom. Bruce Spiegelman, director of the lab, named the hormone irisin after the Greek messenger goddess Iris.

Mice eating a high-fat diet that were given the gene for irisin burned more energy and had lower body weight than mice receiving a placebo (Nature, DOI: 10.1038/nature10777).

AND if that doesn't work, here's a workout video for you!


See more at www.women-workout-routines.com/

4th International GOCE User workshop

The European Space Agency (ESA) is organising the 4th in a series of International GOCE User Workshops from 31 March to 1 April 2011 at the Technische Universität München (TUM), Germany.

It is intended to provide potential users of GOCE data products with the opportunity to obtain the latest information on satellite performance as well as details regarding ground segment operations, data products and user services. 

It will allow users to learn about product content and quality and the outcome of the data calibration and validation. This Workshop is seeking the presentation of new results based on GOCE data in all application areas. 

Two months prior to the Workshop, the European Space Agency will release the second generation gravity field solutions based on GOCE data.

Further details available on the GOCE Portal

ESA ESERO Project: Summer Workshop for Secondary School Science Teachers

The International Space Station, the largest laboratory ever built in space, is the result of many years of cooperation between the USA, Russia, Canada, Japan and Europe.


This illustration shows the Automated Transfer Vehicle, ATV, that carries food, clothing, fuel tanks, air and drinking water to the ISS crew.

The first launch of this supply vessel in 2008 marked the first ever rendezvous and docking of a European spacecraft in orbit.


Credits: V. Bétoulaud

The European Space Agency is providing many innovative and inspiring aids to teachers to enhance their curriculum with space related subjects. Now ESA is inviting educators to a summer workshop at its establishment in the Netherlands from 28 to 30 June 2010.

ESA’s Directorate of Human Spaceflight has been using the International Space Station as a 'classroom in space' for many educational events and for the production of educational material made available to teachers, science educators and all interested.

ISS will continue in orbit till at least 2020 – and the educational side of the ISS will be even stonger in the future as the focus of the ISS activities is being turned from construction to routine operation.

For more information contact ESA directly by following this link