According to recent research, the average young U.S. adults gain 30 pounds by the time when they become 50 years old.
The age-related weight gain happens even though most people try to eat less over time.
Why does the weight gain happen in middle age?
One recent study from NIH provides an answer.
In studies with lab animals, they found that an enzyme known as DNA-PK (DNA-dependent protein kinase) could slow down the metabolism in the body, making fat harder to burn.
The team discovered that the muscles of mice and monkeys don’t show much DNA-PK activity until middle age. At middle age, the enzyme’s activity spiked.
Could blocking the increased enzyme improve fat burning? To find out, the researchers used a drug that stops the enzyme from working.
When fed a high-fat diet, obese mice receiving the drug didn’t gain as much weight as other mice and were protected from type 2 diabetes.
The drug also increased the fitness level of obese and middle-age mice.
The results show that there could be a genetic program driven by an overactive enzyme that promotes weight gain and loss of exercise capacity at mid-life.
Therefore, people should not just attribute mid-lie weight gain to poor lifestyle choices and lack of will power.
The researchers also suggest that findings were only shown in animals. And this type of drug hasn’t been tested in people.
It might not work or could have serious side effects.
So, if you gain weight in mid-life, what can you do to protect your health?
Another study gives an answer: exercise training.
The researchers find that middle-aged couch potatoes may reduce or reverse the risk of heart failure linked to a sedentary lifestyle if they do two years of regular aerobic exercise training.
These people got significant improvements in how their body used oxygen and had decreased cardiac stiffness after two years, both markers of a healthier heart.
The researchers suggest that aerobic exercises are sustained activities, such as walking, swimming, running and others that strengthen the heart and other muscles and help the body use oxygen effectively.
Therefore, the key to a healthier heart in middle age is the right dose of exercise, at the right time in life.
The optimal dose of the right kind of exercise, which is four to five times a week, and the ‘sweet spot’ in time, which is late-middle age, can work best to improve heart health.
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