Heena Sharma Blog

Eating a big breakfast rather than a large dinner may prevent obesity and high blood sugar, according to study which may lead to better clinical dietary recommendations to reduce body weight and prevent metabolic diseases . The study, published in The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism, assessed 16 men who consumed a low-calorie breakfast and high-calorie dinner -- and vice versa in a second round -- over the course of three days. "Our results show that a meal eaten for breakfast, regardless of the amount of calories it contains, creates twice as high diet-induced thermogenesis as the same meal consumed for dinner," said the study's corresponding author, Juliane Richter from the University of Lubeck in Germany. "This finding is significant for all people as it underlines the value of eating enough at breakfast," Richter said. Read More

Research have engineered biohybrid nerve tissue -- containing both living cells and non-living components -- to develop 3D models of neural networks , an advance that may lead to better understanding of how the brain works. The researchers, including Gelson Pagan-Diaz from the University of Illinois in the US, said the produced tissue is similar to a computer processing unit, which provided the basic principle to today's supercomputers. The study, published in the journal PNAS, noted that the 3D tissue , consisting of neurons, can provide the ability to develop tissue models for drug screening, or processing units for biological computers. The researchers said using a 3D model of these networks outside the body may offer researchers a new tool to understand how these connections work. These models, they said, can help shed light on how abnormalities form such as what gives rise to diseases such as Alzheimer's. According to the researchers, the 3D tissues can be...

Healthy sleep habits can make a big difference in one's life but work week keeps us all a bit short on sleep, which can be severely harmful, says a study. In the Journal of Lipid Research, researchers at Pennsylvania State University reported that just a few days of sleep deprivation can make participants feel less full after eating and metabolise the fat in food differently. Sleep disruption has been known to be having harmful effects on metabolism for some time. Orfeu Buxton, a professor at Penn State and one of the senior authors of the new study, contributed to a lot of the research demonstrating that long-term sleep restriction puts people at a higher risk of obesity and diabetes. However, Buxton said, most of those studies have focused on glucose metabolism, which is important for diabetes, while relatively few have assessed digestion of lipids from food. Kelly Ness, now a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Washington, ran the study when she was a grad...

Green tea may reduce the risk of obesity and a number of inflammatory biomarkers linked with poor health, a study conducted in mice suggests. Mice fed a diet of two per cent green tea extract fared far better than those that ate a diet without it, according to the study published in the Journal of Nutritional Biochemistry. The finding has prompted an upcoming study of green tea's potential benefits in people at high risk of diabetes and heart disease. The benefits seen in the study appear to stem from improved gut health, including more beneficial microbes in the intestines of the mice and less permeability in the intestinal wall -- a condition typically called "leaky gut" in people. "This study provides evidence that green tea encourages the growth of good gut bacteria, and that leads to a series of benefits that significantly lower the risk of obesity," said Richard Bruno, the study's lead author and a professor at The Ohio State University...

Compounds found in green tea , carrots and rice have helped reverse Alzheimer's-like symptoms in mice genetically programmed to develop the neurodegenerative disease , a study has found. The study, published in the Journal of Biological Chemistry, was carried in mice, and many mouse discoveries never translate into human treatments, researchers noted. However, the findings lend credence to the idea that certain readily available, plant-based supplements might offer protection against dementia in humans, they said. "You do not have to wait 10 to 12 years for a designer drug to make it to market; you can make these dietary changes today," said Terrence Town, a professor at the University of Southern California (USC) in the US. "I find that very encouraging," Town said in statement. The study supports the idea that combination therapy, rather than a single magic bullet, may offer the best approach to treating people living with Alzheimer's. Co...

A new study now finds that the quality of a person's marriage could be affected by their genes. The study was conducted at at Binghamton University, State University of New York. A research team, led by Richard Mattson evaluated whether different genotypes of the Oxytocin Receptor gene (OXTR) influenced how partners support one another, which is a key determinant of overall marital quality. OXTR was targeted because it is related to the regulation and release of oxytocin, which is a hormone associated with feeling love and attachment. Oxytocin also appears to be relevant to social cognition and a wide range of social behaviour. Speaking about the study, Mattson said that while prior research has hinted that marital quality is, at least partially, impacted by genetic factors, and that oxytocin may be relevant to social support -- a critical aspect of intimate partnerships, his study is the first to provide evidence that variation on specific genes related to oxyto...

Regular aerobic exercise can help in improving thinking skills not only in older people but in young people as well, a recent study suggests. According to the research, regular aerobic exercise such as walking, cycling or climbing stairs may improve thinking skills not only in older people but in young people as well. The study also found that the positive effect of exercise on thinking skills may increase as people age. The specific set of thinking skills that improved with exercise is called executive function. Executive function is a person's ability to regulate their own behavior, pay attention, organise and achieve goals. "As people age, there can be a decline in thinking skills, however our study shows that getting regular exercise may help slow or even prevent such decline. We found that all participants who exercised not only showed improvements in executive function but also increased the thickness in an area of the outer layer of their brain," said...

Chickens that have been genetically modified to produce human proteins in eggs can offer a cost-effective method of producing certain types of drugs. The study which initially focused on producing high quality proteins for use in scientific research, found the drugs work at least as well as the same proteins produced using existing methods. The study was carried out at the University of Edinburgh's Roslin Institute and Roslin Technologies, a company set up to commercialise research at The Roslin Institute and is published in BMC Biotechnology. High quantities of the proteins can be recovered from each egg using a simple purification system and there are no adverse effects on the chickens themselves, which lay eggs as normal. According to researchers, the findings provide sound evidence for using chickens as a cheap method of producing high quality drugs for use in research studies and, potentially one day, in patients. Notably, eggs are already used for growing vi...

Avoiding greasy, fatty and oily foods is the key to a successful dieting plan . But have you ever wondered why we tend to crave the very foods that we try to avoid when dieting? Or wished you could suppress the feeling before it forced you into eating junk food? A recent study identified new brain circuits that may act as a brake on binge eating and junk food craving. Findings of the study were published in the Journal of Behavioral Brain Research. "Craving for foods high in fat - this includes many junk foods - is an important part of obesity and binge eating," said Jonathan Hommel, lead author of the study. "When trying to lose weight people often strive to avoid fatty foods, which ironically increases motivation and craving for these foods and can lead to overeating. Even worse, the longer someone abstains from fatty foods, the greater the cravings become," Hommel explained. Read More Business Standard