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Men who wish to have children in the near future should consider going to the gym.
In a new study led by Kristin Stanford, a research scientist in physiology and cell biology at the Ohio State Medical College at Wexner Medical Center, paternal exercise has had a significant impact on the metabolic health of offspring adulthood.
Laurie Goodyear, of the Joslin Diabetes Center and Harvard Medical School, led the study, published today in the journal Diabetes.
"These works constitute an important step in the learning of metabolic diseases and prevention at the cellular level," said Dr. K. Craig Kent, Dean of the Ohio State College of Medicine.
Recent studies have linked the development of type 2 diabetes with impaired metabolic health and poor parenting. More and more evidence is showing that fathers play an important role in obesity and metabolic programming of their offspring.
Stanford is a member of the State of Ohio's Diabetes and Metabolism Research Center. His team studied the impact of a father's exercise program on the metabolic health of his offspring. With the help of a mouse model, they fed male mice for three weeks, either with a normal diet or with a high fat diet. Some mice from each diet group were sedentary and others exercised freely. After three weeks, the mice and their offspring followed a normal diet under sedentary conditions for one year.
Researchers reported that adult offspring of exercise bulls improved glucose metabolism, decreased body weight, and decreased body fat.
"Here's what's really interesting: the children of fathers fed a high-fat diet had fewer results, so they were more glucose-intolerant, but exercise neutralized that effect," Stanford said. "When the father did exercise, even with a high-fat diet, we found an improvement in the metabolic health of their adult offspring."
The Stanford team also found that the exercise resulted in modifications to the father's sperm gene expression that suppresses the deleterious effects of feeding and transfer to the offspring.
"We have seen a big change in their small RNA profile, and now we want to know exactly what small RNAs are responsible for these metabolic improvements, where it happens in offspring and why," Stanford said.
Previous studies in this group have shown that when mouse mothers exercise, their children also have beneficial effects on metabolism.
"On the basis of both studies, we are determining if the exercise of both parents has even greater effects on improving metabolism and the overall health of the offspring. to humans, this would be extremely important for the health of the next generation, "said Goodyear.
The researchers believe that the results support the hypothesis that small RNAs could help transmit parental environmental information to the next generation.
"This could be reflected in humans.We know that in adult men, obesity lowers testosterone levels, sperm count and motility, as well as the number of live births," he said. said Stanford. "If we ask someone who is preparing to have a child to exercise moderately, even a month before conception, this could have a significant effect on the health of their sperm and about the long-term metabolic health of their children. "
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