Training at home

I see many athletes and people who usually go to gym complaining about their losses (muscle, strength etc). Which seems to be unpleasant, but given my average training intensity, i could always train better and more intensive at home than in a gym.

At the moment i am training 4 days a week, Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday, with weekend allocated for recovery.

This is for example my today training, step by step:

Dynamic warmup

30 skipping jumps
20 jumping jacks
10 squats
10 heels raises right and 10 left
10 hip raises
10 windmill forward and 10 backward

Skill progression

5 pikes
5 jumps

Full body training

6 series of
10 mountain climbers
10 jumping jacks
5 crunches
with 30 sec rest in between. 

Core and glutes training

4 series of
10 superman
10 leg wipers
7 single leg hip raises right and 7 left
with 60 sec rest in between

10 plank switches in the end

and cooldown stretching

30 sec standing side stretch left and then 30 sec right
60 sec deep squat hold
30 sec hip stretch left and then 30 sec right
30 sec lunge stretch left and then 30 sec right

On the Intensity scale this is 3 out of 10 (as i just try to build some strength and stamina at the moment. I hope this can inspire you to try something similar at home.

See you soon and wish you well

G.

Coronavirus self-isolation

I have always wondered how retirement early could feel, in terms of doing different things and having all the time in the world. Apparently, my wish was granted, under stranger than life circumstances. I was sent home for 12 weeks, and i am being paid, so this can be like a test for my future early retirement plans.

The conditions are not optimal, the market seems to sink faster than Titanic, but i have 3 months to fill up. We will see what is next.

The link for my journal is here.

And if you, like me, hate the fact that the gym is closed, this is my alternative for training at home (link). The website is quite good, and they also got phone apps for weight training, training at home, running and nutrition. I started 64 months ago to train with them, and they keep improving.

See you soon.
G.

Microbiota - medical therapy

There are application in the food industry. Prebiotic fibers and probiotic organisms are added to infant nutrition to modulate microbiota. Lately there is a transition from prebiotic approach to synbiotic approach ( combining prebiotic fibers with specific microorganisms that can be stimulated by those prebiotic fibers). This is a breakthrough and it is already applied to the infant formula. Bifidobacterium and lactic acid bacteria are the ones used at the moment, with other beneficial bacteria researched for future use. There are ideas for the use of synbiotics to tackle allergies or to further support development of an healthy immune system. Many people now are fully aware of the antibiotic side effects on microbiome and they want to know more about how to modulate the microbiome in a positive health direction.

There are also applications in the animal health and food chain. There is a ban on antimicrobial promoters in some countries for a better quality. In hatcheries, for eggs and poultry, when there is no hen touch, faecal transplantation is used (dried poultry poop), just to mention one example. In the future there will be more methods to modulate and manipulate the microbiota.

And talking about faecal transplantation, there are at least 15 stool banks in the world right now, with the Openbiome in U.S.A. being the biggest. The stools can be used in treating Clostridium difficile, assisting in research for IBS and some other diseases. Only 2.5% of the potential donors are suitable after they are tested. In Netherlands for example, the stool bank has only 8 active donors and they treated 70-80 patients until now.

With this little accolade, our journey of knowledge of microbiota is finished at the moment. I hope everyone enjoyed this and you can give me ideas about other major new researches that you want to learn about.

See you soon!
G.

Microbiota - Inflammatory Bowel Diseases (IBD)

IBD is a group of conditions in which the colon and/or the small intestine becomes inflamed. Crohn's disease and ulcerative diseases are the two main types of Inflammatory Bowel Disease. In Crohn's disease both small and large intestine are affected, and in some rare cases even the mouth, oesophagus and the stomach. In ulcerative colitis only the large intestine and the rectum are affected. 

IBD is a chronic disease with two different states, a high active state of the disease called active inflammation and an inactive state called remission. In the active state the inflammation is accompanied by unpaired barrier function, so the defense mechanism is not properly working. 

Are there any ways for our body to keep the intestinal barrier function as good as possible? First, a layer of epithelial cells connected by tight junctions, covered with a mucus layer to protect the mucosal surface from harmful bacteria and molecules. Second, on top of this layer, we got the gut microbiota that is covering the mucus layer with the good, inoffensive microbes. 

IBD is emerging as a worldwide epidemic, especially in the high income countries, making researchers to think that all these diseases are mainly caused by the environment. The lifestyle in developed countries might impair the microbial colonization. There are multiple factors involver: birth at hospital, with or without caesarean delivery, decreased family sizes, decreased contact with soil organisms, increased antibiotic use, body washing with antibacterial soap and shower gel, increased use of processed foods. The gut microbiota plays a big role in priming and regulating the immune system. In IBD the microbiota changes in composition, being an essential factor driving the inflammation. Markers of IBD can be found in the microbiota, such as reduction of microbial diversity and increase in gammaproteobacteria (this group holds many potential pathogens). 

Gammaproteobacteria

Adherent-invasive microbes like E.Coli and Fusiobacterium can be found, combined with a decrease of beneficial ones (Bifidobacterium, Lactobacillus and F. prausnitzii). All these signs can be used to diagnose the disease. These changes can affect the microbiota as a whole, decreasing the short chain fatty acids like Butyrate, increasing the oxidative stress, causing imbalance between reactive oxygen species and antioxidant defences, causing tissue damage.

Attempts to restore microbiota composition using microbiota based therapies showed positive and promising results, causing remission in IBD, but each patient response is different, and faecal microbiota transplant methods are not superior to the current therapies. But microbiota based therapies can be used in the future to treat and diagnose IBD.

Next post will be the last post of the microbiota series, and it iwll be about the medical therapy. 

Coronavirus - update 12.03.2020

I see a lot of misinformation online, so i will just underline and analyse some data.

First, we are in a race against time. A good vaccine, enough tested and highly effective will take at the fastest pace 8-12 months. There are other ideas such as using RNA or DNA based vaccines, but if history is teaching us something, they already tried to do similar ones for Zika and Ebola, without success. Some companies are trying to skip the 'test on animals' steps and start to test straight on humans. The most promising one needed 58 volunteers between age  18-55 for the program, paid up to 1100 $ for this. Got around 1000 volunteers. This will come with a price (unknown side effects).
A realistic date for a fully working vaccine is May 2021.

Second, the strategy a country use to prevent or delay the spreading may be different from one country to another. They can choose an economic solution (money and economy first), a popular solution (people first) or choose to ignore the threat (kind of like every country did at the beginning, the measures taken these days were supposed to be done after 24th of January to be effective). Active measures against pandemic diseases do not work when you already have more that sick 1000 people. Some professionals tends to be more alarmist, saying that measures taken after you have 2 people already sick will not work (2-3 sick people can infect more than 100 in the next 2 weeks. So, depending on the measures taken, you can have 7,3% deaths (Italy case - 17660 cases and 1266 deaths) versus 0.9 (South Korea - 8086 cases and 72 deaths). We have China with 3.93%, Iran with 4.54% (Iran doesn't have enough medical equipment to respond effectively due to the international sanctions), but we also have Singapore with 200 cases and no death. As per 12.03.2020, the worst affected in Europe are Italy (17660-1266 deaths), France (3661 - 79 deaths), Spain (5232 - 133 deaths), Germany (3675 - 8 deaths) and Switzerland (1121 - 11 deaths). Romania has 64 confirmed cases.

Another aspect that you should know is that the estimate proportion of cases confirmed versus total numbers it may be 1 to 5. So if you have 1000 cases confirmed, most probably you have 5000 people infected.

And, viral shedding for the new mutated strains can be up to 36 days with an average of 20 days, while the official channels suggested 14 days. Another problem to pile on the minus list. (Viral shedding refers to the expulsion and release of virus progeny following successful reproduction during a host-cell infection. Once replication has been completed and the host cell is exhausted of all resources in making viral progeny, the viruses may begin to leave the cell by several methods.)

I hope this helps. I will add some links for the live update on the countries where i got friends, i hope it will help track it better.

UK - https://www.gov.uk/guidance/coronavirus-covid-19-information-for-the-public#number-of-cases

ITALY - http://www.protezionecivile.gov.it/media-comunicazione/comunicati-stampa/-/content-view/view/1226619

FRANCE - https://www.bfmtv.com/sante/direct-coronavirus-covid-19-france-etats-unis-donald-trump-carte-cas-mort-symptomes-emmanuel-macron-italie-espagne/

SPAIN - https://www.rtve.es/noticias/20200314/mapa-del-coronavirus-espana/2004681.shtml

ROMANIA - http://www.ms.ro/2020/03/13/5-noi-cazuri-de-imbolnavire-cu-noul-coronavirus/

Ask me and i add other countries link if you need it.

Hope it helps!

G.

Microbiota - Next Gen Probiotics

This next generation probiotics can be helpful in new personalised therapies. They are made from microorganisms used to improve health, you can found them in foods and supplements. The ones sold today are mainly lactic acid producing bacteria like bifidobacteria and lactobacillus, isolated from yogurt and milk.

Lactobacillus reuteri

The next generation probiotics can come from the human gut microbiota and they will be used as a medical therapy instead of only improving health. They will be used in conjunction with bacterial cultivation, genome sequencing and tools to modify bacterial genomes. Their range is extended by our ever increasing knowledge of the composition and function of the human gut microbiome. The Next-Gen probiotics are coming from healthy humans. Take Clostridium Difficile infection (CDI) for example, which is prevented by the healthy microbiota acting as a barrier. However, using antibiotics (this being a major risk factor), can be weakened. We can use antibiotic also as an effective treatment for CDI, but because of the consequences mentioned before, relapse occurs on up to 30% of the patients. There were attempts of successfully eliminate CDI via faecal transplantation, and one of the more promising species was identified for future use. It is called Lactobacillus reuteri and it is a bacterium producing an antibacterial compound called reuterin, using glycerol. This bacteria has antibiotic resistance, preventing the recurrence of CDI.

Other promising candidates are Faecalibacterium prausnitii, Eubacterium halii, Bacteroides Fragilis and Akkermansia muciniphila. Take the last one, Akkermansia muciniphila, which is present in low levels in the intestinal tract of the individuals who have Diabetes type 2 or are obese. Tested on mice, reduced the body weight, enhanced glucose tolerance and decreased the presence of endotoxins in blood. The major difference from the actual probiotics is that the new ones will originate from the human microbiota and will be used for personalised therapies (if a patient is lacking certain beneficial microbes, they will be administered). But they are not on the market yet and further research is needed at the moment.

Akkermansia muciniphila

Microbiota - The faecal microbiota transplant

The faecal transplant os a very good tool to prove a causative role of our gut microbiome in curing different diseases. Because of this reason, the interest in faecal microbiota transplant is rising. We mentioned some research done on mice, but this is a well known practice, and we have a Chinese medical manual from the 4th century A.C. describing the procedure done on humans, as a remedy for food poisoning. But how do we do it today? A healthy donor donates a stool sample, which is tested for certain diseases, frozen and given to the patient later by a tube or as capsules, in order to reach the small intestine. Enema can be also used. This is working by restoring a gut microbiome that it is out of balance, bringing equilibrium and leaving hardly any room for pathogens. However, use of antibiotics and some other factors can disrupt the balance, allowing the pathogens like clostridium difficile to cause infections (symptoms are chronic gut inflammation and persistent diarrhoea). Using antibiotics to cure an infection with clostridium difficile is not effective, as the disease is recurring, and the bacteria is becoming resistant to antibiotics, because this clostridium difficile can colonize an altered microbiota composition. By restoring the microbiota composition, 90% of the patients were cured.

In this case, the faecal transplant is more efficient that antibiotics. Because the gut microbiota of a healthy donor is introduced, restoring the balance and breaking the cycle of the disease. When the healthy microbiota colonize the inside, no more room is left for Clostridium Difficile. Small results were also found in patients with diabetes type 2. Many scientists work to replace the fecal transplants with an odourless mix of bacterial strains derived from the human fecal material.

Do not try this at home, does not matter how many Youtube video you see about this.

The following post will be about the next generation probiotics.

See you soon!
G.

Microbiota - personalized nutrition

Everyone knows that we should eat more fibers and less saturated fats, but personalized nutrition is more than that. We are talking about choosing the healthy nutrition that it is different for different people. You need to take in account diseases you had or got, the genetic and physiological differences, character, habits and social environment.

Each of us is different, and our response to diet or even the same dietary component is different. Let's say caffeine for example: one can drink it after dinner and sleep well at night, while another cannot sleep if is drinking coffee after lunch. Your body and behaviour is complex, and it will determine how you respond to a new diet.

One research group from Israel tried to make a prediction based on one's glycemic response ( the glycemic response to food is the effect of that food on the blood glucose levels). They found out that different people react very different towards identical food components. The 800 participants that their blood sugar measured every 5 minutes with a special device, and they also used and app to report what and when they ate, when they sleep and how long and when they exercise. In the end their stool samples were collected and their composition and activity of the gut microbiota was measured. After all the data was collected, they made an algorithm that could successfully predict the blood glucose response for the participants. This was also used to successfully predict the response of 100 new participants, so this algorithm can be used to predict someone response to a dietary component and to advise a personalized diet. The conclusion was that some people respond very different to the same food product, so for these people some diets will not work, or even have the exact opposite effect. For one of the subjects, they got a bigger response eating lean fish that eating ice cream. This can happen because of our genetics, our lifestyle and our microbiota is different. The response to food is due to all these personal settings. The ability of a person to measure blood glucose levels is a key factor in the development of diabetes and obesity. A specific diet for a weight loss usually aim to control glucose levels and yet different people are told to use the same diets.

In the future is possible that the personalized diet will be a common occurrence, helping us to be healthier and live longer.

That's it for today, next post will be about faecal microbiota transplant.

See you soon!
G.