Is obesity all in your head? New research suggests genes predispose people to obesity act in the brain and that some people may simply be hardwired to overeat.
An international team of researchers, co-led by the University of Michigan, found six new genes that help explain body mass index and obesity, and all but one of the genes are tied to the brain rather than to metabolic functions, such as fat storage and sugar metabolism.
Tributyltin, a ubiquitous pollutant that has a potent effect on gene activity, could be promoting obesity, according to an article in the December issue of BioScience. The chemical is used in antifouling paints for boats, as a wood and textile preservative, and as a pesticide on high-value food crops, among many other applications.
Affecting sensitive receptors in the cells of animals, from water fleas to humans, tributyltin can, at very low concentrations — a thousand times lower than pollutants that are known to interfere with sexual development of wildlife species.
University of California at Irvine researchers have found a molecular link between circadian rhythms — our own body clock — and metabolism. The discovery reveals new possibilities for the treatment of diabetes, obesity and other related diseases.
Paolo Sassone-Corsi, distinguished professor and chair of Pharmacology, and his colleagues have identified that an essential protein called CLOCK that regulates the body’s circadian rhythms, works in balance with another protein called SIRT1 that modulates how much energy a cell uses.
In the first study to use continuous measurements of blood pressure during overnight sleep, a research abstract presented at Sleep 2008, the 22nd Annual Meeting of the Associated Professional Sleep Societies (APSS) finds that all severities of sleep-related breathing disorders (SRBD) in children are associated with elevated blood pressure during sleep compared with non-snoring control children.
The study, authored by Rosemary Horne, PhD, of Monash University in Melbourne, Australia, focused on 88 children between seven and 13 years of age, including 68 referred for the assessment of SRBD and 20 non-snoring controls.
“Recent data on the long-term effectiveness of bariatric surgery on BMI suggest that, for most patients, BMI will be maintained substantially below preoperative levels, though some patients regain weigh and relapse toward morbid obesity,” the authors conclude. This subgroup may carry genetic susceptibilities to obesity that overcome the effects of bypass surgery.
Researchers who had bred a group of mice in hopes of learning more about a brain hormone that stimulates appetite got a bit of a surprise when they saw that the rodents would suddenly collapse and fall fast asleep with no provocation. As a result, Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator Masashi Yanagisawa and colleagues at the University of Texas’ Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas have an exciting new lead into the genesis of sleep and the origins of narcolepsy, a severe sleep disorder in humans.
In 1998, Yanagisawa discovered the orexins, small brain proteins and their receptors that regulate feeding behavior in mice. To probe the role that orexins play in regulating appetite, Yanagisawa and his colleagues developed a strain of knockout mice whose orexin genes do not function properly.
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As of May 2, 2009 at 9:47 p.m. (-0500) (ET), the U.S. population
was 306,340,710. Sleep researchers estimate approximately seven percent
of the population suffers from obstructive sleep apnea. Using that
estimate, there are potentially 21,443,850 apneics in the U.S.
~~ Apnea around the world ~~
As of May 2, 2009 at 9:47 p.m. (-0500) (ET), the world population
was 6,777,286,604. Sleep researchers estimate approximately seven percent
of the population suffers from obstructive sleep apnea. Using that
estimate, there are potentially 474,410,062 apneics in the world.
