Science Weekly - 11th Sep 2020

The first week of September looked pretty productive in the science world across the globe. We brought you papers from Australia, the USA, Finland and other parts of Europe. Would you eat lab-grown meat? Gen Z doesn't seem to be too keen. There are also three different topics around COVID that may be interesting for a range of personal training clients.

Here are the highlights:

• Red hot meat: The wrong recipe for heart disease
• ​Vitamin D deficiency may raise risk of getting COVID-19, study finds
• ​Linking calorie restriction, body temperature and healthspan
• ​Gen Z not ready to eat lab-grown meat
• ​Gut microbiota not involved in the incidence of gestational diabetes mellitus
• ​COVID-stress may be hard to beat even with exercise
• ​Epigenetic changes precede onset of diabetes
• ​Weight stigma predicts emotional distress and binge eating during COVID-19
• ​Probiotics may help manage childhood obesity

Red hot meat: The wrong recipe for heart disease

From MasterChef to MKR, the world's best chefs have taught us how to barbeque, grill and panfry a steak to perfection. But while the experts may be seeking that extra flavor, new research suggests high-heat caramelization could be bad for our health.

Source: University of South Australia

Vitamin D deficiency may raise risk of getting COVID-19, study finds

In a retrospective study of patients tested for COVID-19, researchers found an association between vitamin D deficiency and the likelihood of becoming infected with the coronavirus.

Source: University of Chicago Medical Center

Linking calorie restriction, body temperature and healthspan

Cutting calories significantly may not be an easy task for most, but it's tied to a host of health benefits ranging from longer lifespan to a much lower chance of developing cancer, heart disease, diabetes and neurodegenerative conditions such as Alzheimer's. A new study illuminates the critical role that body temperature plays in realizing these diet-induced health benefits.

Source: Scripps Research Institute

Gen Z not ready to eat lab-grown meat

72% of Gen Z don't want to eat it
New research found that, despite having a great concern for the environment and animal welfare, 72 percent of Generation Z were not ready to accept cultured meat - defined in the survey as a lab-grown meat alternative produced by in-vitro cell cultures of animal cells, instead of from slaughtered animals.

Source: University of Sydney

Gut microbiota not involved in the incidence of gestational diabetes mellitus

But gut microbiota may be modulated by fish oil and probiotics
Consuming the combination of fish oil and probiotic food supplements modulate the composition of gut microbiota in overweight and obese pregnant women, reveals a new study. The same study shows that gut microbiota composition and function is not related to gestational diabetes.

Source: University of Turku

COVID-stress may be hard to beat even with exercise

In a study of twins, people who reported increasing their physical activity after the start of COVID-19 stay-at-home orders reported higher levels of stress and anxiety than those whose activity levels stayed the same.

Source: Washington State University

Epigenetic changes precede onset of diabetes

Epigenetic changes in the islets of Langerhans of the pancreas can be detected in patients several years before the diagnosis of type 2 diabetes. These changes are responsible for the altered methylation activity of specific genes which differs from that in healthy individuals. In humans, 105 such changes have been discovered in blood cells.

Source: German Center for Diabetes Research (Deutsches Zentrum fuer Diabetesforschung DZD)

Weight stigma predicts emotional distress and binge eating during COVID-19

New research shows that young adults who experienced weight stigma before the pandemic have higher levels of depressive symptoms, stress, eating as a coping strategy, and are more likely to binge-eat during COVID-19 compared to those who haven't experienced weight stigma.

Source: UConn Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity

Probiotics may help manage childhood obesity

Probiotics may help children and adolescents with obesity lose weight when taken alongside a calorie-controlled diet, according to a new study. The study found that obese children who were put on a calorie-restricted diet and given probiotics Bifidobacterium breve BR03 and Bifidobacterium breve B632, lost more weight and had improved insulin sensitivity compared with children on a diet only.

Source: European Society of Endocrinology