Monday 21 September 2015

Beet juice boosts muscle power

Beet juice boosts muscle power in heart patients

Scientists have evidence that Popeye was right: spinach makes you stronger. But it's the high nitrate content in the leafy greens,  not the iron,  that creates the effect. Building on a growing body of work that suggests dietary nitrate improves muscle performance in many elite athletes, researchers found that drinking concentrated beet juice, also high in nitrates, increases muscle power in patients with heart failure.

Washington University School of Medicine study


Monday 14 September 2015

Vitamin D3 supplements could increase muscle power and boost athletic performance


Vitamin D3 supplements could increase muscle power and boost athletic performance



The following conclusions were given in the study;
Vitamin D 3 have potential ergogenic effects on the human metabolic system and lead to multiple physiological enhancements. These dosages could increase aerobic capacity, muscle growth, force and power production, and a decreased recovery time from exercise. 

These dosages could also improve bone density. However, both deficiency (12.5 to 50 nmol/L) and high levels of vitamin D (>125 nmol/L) can have negative side effects, with the potential for an increased mortality. Thus, maintenance of optimal serum levels between 75 to 100 nmol/L and ensuring adequate amounts of other essential nutrients including vitamin K are consumed, is key to health and performance.

 Coaches, medical practitioners, and athletic personnel should recommend their patients and athletes to have their plasma 25(OH)D measured, in order to determine if supplementation is needed. Based on the research presented on recovery, force and power production, 4000-5000 IU/day of vitamin D 3 in conjunction with a mixture of 50 mcg/day to 1000 mcg/day of vitamin K 1 and K 2 seems to be a safe dose and has the potential to aid athletic performance. 

Lastly, no study in the athletic population has increased serum 25(OH)D levels past 100 nmol/L, (the optimal range for skeletal muscle function) using doses of 1000 to 5000 IU/day. Thus, future studies should test the physiological effects of higher dosages (5000 IU to 10,000 IU/day or more) of vitamin D 3 in combination with varying dosages of vitamin K 1 and vitamin K 2 in the athletic population to determine optimal dosages needed to maximize performance.


Plausible ergogenic effects of vitamin D on athletic performance and recovery 

Dylan T. Dahlquist2, Brad P. Dieter3 and Michael S. Koehle1*journal of the International Society of Sports Nutrition 2015, 12:33 doi:10.1186/s12970-015-0093-8

Friday 11 September 2015

chemicals from Green tomato and apples can increase aging muscles mass and strength

As we grow older, we lose strength and muscle mass. However, the cause of age-related muscle weakness and atrophy has remained a mystery.



Scientists at the University of Iowa have discovered the first example of a protein that causes muscle weakness and loss during aging. The protein, ATF4, is a transcription factor that alters gene expression in skeletal muscle, causing reduction of muscle protein synthesis, strength, and mass. The UI study also identifies two natural compounds, one found in apples and one found in green tomatoes, which reduce ATF4 activity in aged skeletal muscle. The findings, which were published online Sept. 3 in the Journal of Biological Chemistry, could lead to new therapies for age-related muscle weakness and atrophy.

"Many of us know from our own experiences that muscle weakness and atrophy are big problems as we become older," says Christopher Adams, MD, PhD, UI professor of internal medicine and senior study author. "These problems have a major impact on our quality of life and health."

Previously, Adams and his team had identified ursolic acid, which is found in apple peel, and tomatidine, which comes from green tomatoes, as small molecules that can prevent acute muscle wasting caused by starvation and inactivity. Those studies set the stage for testing whether ursolic acid and tomatidine might be effective in blocking the largest cause of muscle weakness and atrophy: aging.

In their latest study, Adams' team found that ursolic acid and tomatidine dramatically reduce age-related muscle weakness and atrophy in mice. Elderly mice with age-related muscle weakness and atrophy were fed diets lacking or containing either 0.27 percent ursolic acid, or 0.05 percent tomatidine for two months. The scientists found that both compounds increased muscle mass by 10 percent, and more importantly, increased muscle quality, or strength, by 30 percent. The sizes of these effects suggest that the compounds largely restored muscle mass and strength to young adult levels.

"Based on these results, ursolic acid and tomatidine appear to have a lot of potential as tools for dealing with muscle weakness and atrophy during aging," Adams says. "We also thought we might be able to use ursolic acid and tomatidine as tools to find a root cause of muscle weakness and atrophy during aging."

Adams' team investigated the molecular effects of ursolic acid and tomatidine in aged skeletal muscle. They found that both compounds turn off a group of genes that are turned on by the transcription factor ATF4. This led them to engineer and study a new strain of mice that lack ATF4 in skeletal muscle. Like old muscles that were treated with ursolic acid and tomatidine, old muscles lacking ATF4 were resistant to the effects of aging.

"By reducing ATF4 activity, ursolic acid and tomatidine allow skeletal muscle to recover from effects of aging," says Adams, who also is a member of the Fraternal Order of Eagles Diabetes Research Center at the UI and a staff physician with the Iowa City Veterans Affairs Medical Center.

The UI study was done in collaboration with Emmyon, Inc., a UI-based biotechnology company founded by Adams, that is now working to translate ursolic acid and tomatidine into foods, supplements, and pharmaceuticals that can help preserve or recover strength and muscle mass as people grow older.

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The above post is reprinted from materials provided by University of Iowa. The original item was written by Jennifer Brown. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.