Healthy but Sedentary People Show Early Decline in Cellular Energy Production
Key takeaways
- “Mitochondrial function is the center of metabolic health,” said the study’s senior author Iñigo San Millan, adjoint assistant professor in the Division of Endocrinology, Metabolism and Diabetes at CU Anschutz.
- Researchers also found that sedentary muscle contained about half as much of a key protein needed to convert sugar into usable energy.
- The protein, MPC1, transports a key byproduct of sugar breakdown into the mitochondria.
Researchers at the University of Colorado Anschutz have found that healthy yet sedentary individuals show a significant, coordinated drop in muscle mitochondrial function that may precede the development of major diseases like cancer, diabetes and Alzheimer’s.
“Mitochondrial function is the center of metabolic health,” said the study’s senior author Iñigo San Millan, adjoint assistant professor in the Division of Endocrinology, Metabolism and Diabetes at CU Anschutz. “If you are 40, healthy and sedentary, it is likely that you already have something going on inside your cells that will likely come back to haunt you in 10 or 15 years.”
The study specifically noted that mitochondria, which process energy within cells, showed a significantly decreased capacity to burn both sugar and fat in healthy individuals who get less than the recommended 150 minutes of exercise a week. Researchers also found that sedentary muscle contained about half as much of a key protein needed to convert sugar into usable energy.