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/

Japanese man takes robot piggyback on French landmark

A robotic outfit that bestows superhuman strength allowed a paralysed Japanese man to tour the steep lanes of France's Mont-Saint-Michel landmark Tuesday -- on a friend's back.

Seiji Uchida, 49, said he had dreamed of visiting the medieval site, a warren of steep steps on a sea-lapped mound off northwestern France, but could not because a motorbike accident in his twenties left him unable to walk.

On Tuesday he fulfilled his wish however, when student Hiromasa Hara donned a Hybrid Assistive Limb, a body-length device developed by Japanese scientists, and gave Uchida a superhuman piggy-back.

The suit is attached to the wearer's back, arms and legs. Reading brain signals and following the wearer's muscular actions, it takes the strain of the load, allowing him to lift up to 200 kilograms (440 pounds).

"It was a dream to come here," said Uchida, who travelled with his wife and four children. "The mount is very difficult to access for someone in a wheelchair," he added.

"I want to show my children that even with a disability you can tackle anything you want."

Robotic Walking Aids: Tokyo

(Image: Yoshikazu Tsuno / AFP / Getty Images)
Employees from the Japanese robotics company Cyberdyne don the company's robot suit "HAL" (Hybrid Assistive Limb) for a walk on a Tokyo street, to celebrate the mass production version of the suit.

Tsukuba University professor Yoshiyuki Sankai and Cyberdyne developed the robot suit to work in unison with the wearer, anticipating the user's motions and adjusting accordingly.

The suit could help with rehabilitation, physical training, heavy labour, and rescue support at disaster sites.

Need a Lift? Try HAL - Hybrid Assistive Limb

Does your body need an upgrade? Then the robot suit HAL (Hybrid Assistive Limb), will do the job in a single, step-motored reboot.

Japanese manufacturer Cyberdyne Inc plans to make 500 this year. HAL’s inventor Yoshiyuki Sankai reckons the suit can, “multiply human strength by a factor of two to ten”. It also makes you look like a gladiator from Tron.

(HAL should not to be confused with the homicidal computer company in The Terminator)