Have you ever wondered why some people can eat an unhealthy diet and live to be 100 while another person eats a similar diet and gets heart disease in the fifties? It all comes down to genetics and gene expression. A relatively new field called nutrigenomics, that studies issues like this, is growing rapidly. Find out more about nutrigenomics and “personalized nutrition.”
Your lifestyle and the diet you eat affect your health on so many levels – it can even affect your genes. Find out what recent research shows about dietary choices and how they impact genes that affect body weight and the risk for disease are expressed. You’ll also find out why it’s important to be consistent with your lifestyle changes.
Holidays, vacations, special events – they can all lead to overindulgences and weight gain. A new study shows exercise is key to staying metabolically healthy when you overeat. Find out more about how exercise helps keep those overindulgences from harming your health.
Ever wonder why some people are naturally thin and struggle to put on weight? Of course, genetics are a factor. Scientists have discovered a gene anomaly in people who struggle to gain weight. Find out more about this finding and other reasons why some people have an easier time avoiding weight gain than others.
You already know resistance exercise affects muscle cells, causing them to hypertrophy and become larger, and exercise in general helps with loss of body fat. Here’s a novel idea – can exercise actually affect the genes that control the growth of fat cells? Researchers at the Lund University think so. Here’s why.
We think of genes as being static. What you’re born with, you’re stuck with. That’s not a good thing if you inherited genes that put you at increased risk for heart disease, cancer or Alzheimer’s disease. On the other hand, those genes may or may not be expressed depending upon your lifestyle and diet. Can you alter the expression of your genes by simply changing what you eat?
You’ve probably known people who love to work out and those who wouldn’t put on a pair of exercise shoes and get sweaty for any reason. Some research suggests that the desire to exercise or stay on the couch is at least partially determined by genes. Find out what research shows about exercise motivation and the role that genes may play.
If everyone in your family is overweight or obese, are you destined to suffer the same fate because of genetics? Maybe not. New research shows that staying active can override the effects of genes that make it harder to lose weight. Find out more about obesity genes and exercise.
You probably already know that having certain genes puts you at greater risk for health problems, but you may have more control over your genetics than you think. According to research, healthy habits like eating your vegetables may affect whether or not those bad genes are expressed. Find out more about the link between lifestyle and genetics.
