Posted on 10/13/2018 4:00:03 PM PDT by RoosterRedux
It’s long been known that physical activity can reduce inflammation in your body and improve heart health.
HIIT was found to be even more effective at improving mitochondria biogenesis in older individuals.
“HIIT reversed many age-related differ- ences in the proteome, particularly of mitochondrial proteins in concert with increased mitochondrial pro- tein synthesis.”
“HIIT increased maximal absolute mitochondrial respiration in young (+49%) and older adults (+69%), whereas a significant increase following CT was observed in young (+38%), but not older adults”
“HIIT training in older adults had strong effect sizes in multiple outcomes, including mitochondrial respiration (1.7), aerobic fitness (0.99), insulin sensitivity (0.5)”
“HIIT revealed a more robust increase in gene transcripts than other exercise modalities, particularly in older adults, although little overlap with corresponding individual protein abundance was noted.”
Researchers enrolled 36 men and 36 women from two age groups—either under 30 or over 65.
They took on three different exercise programs that included high-intensity interval biking, strength training with weights, and one that mixed lighter cycling and lifting. Each group completed their plan for 12 weeks.
“Any exercise is better than being sedentary,” said Dr. Sreekumaran Nair, senior author of the study and a diabetes researcher at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. However, Nair noted that high-intensity interval training (HIIT), in particular, is “highly efficient” when it comes to reversing many age-related changes.
Young and old, men and women
For the National Institutes of Health-funded study, Nair and his colleagues enlisted the help of both men and women from two age groups: The “young” volunteers ranged in age from 18 to 30; “older” volunteers ranged in age between 65 and 80. Next, the researchers divided these participants into three mixed-age groups and assigned each a different supervised exercise training program lasting three months.
The high-intensity interval training training group did three days a week of cycling, with high-intensity bouts sandwiched between low-intensity pedaling, and two days a week of moderately difficult treadmill walking.
The strength training group performed repetitions targeting both lower and upper body muscles just two days each week.Finally, the combined training group cycled (less strenuously than the first group) and lifted weights (fewer repetitions than the second group) for a total of five days a week.
There were clear differences, then, in the amount of time different participants spent in the gym.
Before and after each training session, the researchers assessed various aspects of each volunteer’s physiology, including body mass index, quantity of lean muscle mass and insulin sensitivity, one indication of diabetes.
The researchers also did routine biopsies of each volunteer’s thigh muscles and performed a biochemical analysis in order to establish a comprehensive fingerprint of the muscle.
Analyzing the gathered data, Nair and his colleagues found that all forms of exercise improved overall fitness, as measured by cardiorespiration, and increased insulin sensitivity, which translates into a lower likelihood of developing diabetes.
Although all exercise helped with musculature, strength training was most effective for building muscle mass and for improving strength, which typically declines with age.
Meanwhile, at the cellular level, high-intensity interval training yielded the biggest benefits.
With HIIT, younger participants saw a 49% increase, while older participants saw a 69% increase in mitochondrial capacity.
Every cell in our bodies contain mitochondria. They perform as tiny batteries do, producing much-needed energy that powers everything your cells do.
Interval training also improved volunteers’ insulin sensitivity more than other forms of exercise. Drilling down deeper, Nair and his colleagues compared the protein-level data gathered from participants to understand why exercise provided these benefits.
Enhancing your cellular machinery
If we think of the cell as a corporate hierarchy, genes (DNA) are the executives issuing orders to their middle managers: messenger RNA. Tasked with transcribing this order, the RNA turns to ribosomes, which perform a supervisory role by linking amino acids in order to assemble protein molecules. Finally, the proteins, cellular work horses, carry out the task originally dictated by the gene.
“Proteins sustain environmental damage and the damaged proteins have to be … replaced with newly synthesized (produced) proteins,” explained Nair in an email. “With aging in sedentary people, production of many protein molecules decline. … Gradually the quantity of these protein molecules decrease causing functional decline.”
Analyzing the muscle biopsies, the researchers discovered that exercise boosts cellular production of mitochondrial proteins and the proteins responsible for muscle growth.
“Exercise training, especially high intensity interval training, enhanced the machinery (ribosomes) to produce proteins, increased the production of proteins and enhanced protein abundance in muscle,” Nair said.
He said the results also showed that “the substantial increase in mitochondrial function that occurred, especially in the older people, is due to increase in protein abundance of muscle.”
In some cases, the high-intensity regimen actually seemed to reverse the age-related decline in both mitochondrial function and muscle-building proteins.
Exercise’s ability to transform mitochondria could explain why it benefits our health in so many different ways, according to the authors.
Muscle cells, like brain and heart cells, are unusual in that they divide only rarely compared with most cells in the body. Because muscle, brain and heart cells do wear out yet are not easily replaced, the function of all three of these tissues are known to decline with age, noted Nair.
If exercise restores or prevents deterioration of mitochondria and ribosomes in muscle cells, exercise possibly performs the same magic in other tissues, too. And, although it is important simply to understand how exercise impacts the mechanics of cells, these insights may also allow researchers “to develop targeted drugs to achieve some of the benefits that we derive from the exercise in people who cannot exercise,” Nair said.
‘Almost a medicine’
According to Jennifer Trilk, an assistant professor of physiology and exercise science at University of South Carolina School of Medicine Greenville, the new study is comprehensive and supports previous research, combining it all into one paper.
“We cannot have enough studies surrounding this information because of how impactful it is for health,” said Trilk, who was not involved in the research
She explained that if younger people boost mitochondrial function when they’re young, they would be preventing disease, while for an older population, they would also be preventing disease while maintaining skeletal muscle, which wanes in older age.
“Mitochondrial function is important to almost every cell in the human body,” Trilk said. “So when you don’t have mitochondrial function or when you have mitochondrial dysfunction, you have dysfunction of cells, so from a molecular standpoint, you start seeing cellular dysfunction years before you start seeing the global effect, which ends up coming out as symptoms of diseases: diabetes, cancers and cardiovascular disease.”
Juleen Zierath, a professor of integrative physiology at Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm, Sweden, finds the study to be “a really comprehensive and thorough analysis of human skeletal muscle before and after” adapting to different exercise regimens. Zierath, who did not participate as a researcher in the current study, also appreciated the fact that the authors comprehensively examined the effects on both younger and older participants.
“It teases out some of the training regimes that might be leading to greater effects on what they call mitochondrial fitness,” she said. Compared with the other two exercise programs, interval training “really had a more robust effect” on the machinery of cells, she said.
“It boosted the proteins that are important for mitochondrial function — the oxygen powerhouse of the cells,” Zierath said. “It reversed many of what we call age-related differences in mitochondrial function and oxidative metabolism.”
“Part of what happens with HIIT is, you disturb homeostasis, you exercise at a really high level, and the body needs to cope with that,” she explained.
Even though one program had superior effects, “every single exercise protocol they tested had positive effects,” said Zierath, who is looking forward to future research in this vein.
“Exercise is almost a medicine in some respects,” Zierath said. “It’s never too late to start exercising.”
Here is a thread I posted shortly ago on this subject...Get Fit In 6 Minutes! (How intensity training improves health/aging - video)
BTW, though I am fitness buff, I added a strict HIIT routine last week. I have seen a significant "change" (I think).
I am 65 years old, and I started about six months ago. I usually do five 3-minute intervals, 3 times a week, with the heart rate in the 135-150 range.
I think I feel better, or at least no worse.
Particularly if you don’t eat 5 servings of fruits and vegetables a day followed by no more than 3 cups of coffee and at least one but no more than 2 glasses of wine, a cheese burger and some pork rinds.
I just bought New Balance sneakers, these for $162.
Was going to buy Nike until I found out they support protests against the National anthem. But yeah, exercise, people have no idea how insanely insanely important it is when you get older. I use to be 100 pounds overweight and it was mind blowing how much my body shut down and I didn’t even realize it. For example , hearing and smell shut down. Libido, you can forget. Once I lost that weight it was just a huge WTF realization how much damage that extra weight does. Do whatever it takes to exercise, the human body is not built for a sedentary life. You are built to run so you can hunt. If you don’t do that, everything shuts down assuming you are sick.
I do this 5 days a week, for an hour a day. Incredibly difficult. Definitely have noticed an improvement over time, but am very tired at night.
bookmark
Run 3 miles every other day. If you can’t because of leg, knee issues, take up swimming or bike riding. High aerobic exercise where you get your heart and lungs working as if you are chasing game while hunting is the way to think. The body we have today is a body built to benefit hunter gatherers. When you do high aerobic exercise your body starts relating that to survival and ALL of your senses improve 20 fold. Hearing, sight, smell. I use to be 100 pounds overweight and it really blew my mind how much it shut those senses down. 3 minutes intervals will not benefit you at all. You have to run for half an hour non stop. Get to that point.
But I started doing HIIT last week on my bike (on indoor trainer). I warm up for 10 minutes and then do 4 intervals as hard as I can with each followed by a rest period in which I ride a normal pace until my heart rate drops down to the normal riding level (about 135 in my case). After each HIIT session, I ride for another 5 minutes or more to cool down.
Though this is entirely anecdotal, I have already noticed significant changes not only in physical fitness, but in mental and behavioral ways.
In the video linked up above a doctor says "ride" (or run, row, etc.) like you are trying to escape a wild animal (i.e. full adrenaline rush).
That's the way I do my HIIT and the result so far (if they are not entirely only in my mind) are significant.
More energy, feel strong and verile, powerful dreams, and *gasp* greater libido (not too sure what to do with that).
“Particularly if you don’t eat 5 servings of fruits and vegetables a day followed by no more than 3 cups of coffee and at least one but no more than 2 glasses of wine, a cheese burger and some pork rinds.”
And add in a chicken liver pate. When I am ridding myself of carbs, baked pork rinds (blackberry habanero) and chicken liver pate are no carbs and I can eat them all day. Well, in moderation. I also BBQ stuffed jalapenos with cream cheese and minced shrimp, wrapped in bacon.
I think filling in those other days with a regular cardio of running, biking, swimming, or rowing would not be a problem.
I did notice when I started (last week), I did feel tired.
I sure did love those livers. Pate is even better (tasting that is).
Always loved foie gras.
I workout even harder if I imagine that I AM THE GAME/PREY.
As they say, "run for your life."
I’m 75, walk 5-10 miles a day with a 30lb pack.
Old school aerobic is trash. I disagree with your opinion and so does this article. You actually improve your aerobic system by doing HIIT.
Love your medical articles!!
Aging is a genetic disorder. Exercise certainly helps. Walking especially. But until we correct the genetic problem we will not stop/reverse aging.
exacly if you need motivation why not train for violence?....
also vit b....and tumeric
Thx, Jane. Good to hear from you.
High intensity pizza training
There was a P.E. instructor at Troy named Nick Costes. He had competed in the 56 Olympics in Melbourne.
When I was in my early 40s I had to go back to Troy and raise my GPA before I could enter Grad School. I took easy or interesting courses and pulled a 4.0 that year.
When I was younger I had been a scholarship hurdler and sprinter. I was the worst distance runner on the team. I could not even hold up to a 220.
Well Costes was a practitioner of interval training. When I signed up for the course I had no idea what it involved and was not really expecting any results.
On the final day of class we ran a timed mile. I ran a 5:12 which was maybe two minutes faster than what I could do when was 21.
It then hit me. Interval training really works.
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