A University of New Brunswick research study is examining the link between exercise and the hormone irisin.
UNB assistant professor of kinesiology Dr. Martin Sénéchal is overseeing the study. Sénéchal says he wants to find out why some people have the ability to lose weight through exercise, while other people have difficulties.
“What I’m really interested in is to actually understand why some people who exercise are able to get the benefit of exercise and some people who do actually exercise who are doing the exact kind of intervention don’t get those benefits,” Sénéchal said.
There are two age groups involved in the study — the first group is people between 19 years old and 35 years old. There is also a group of people over the age of 60.
“We want to see whether the response to exercise in terms of releasing that hormone during the exercise is going to be different based on age,” Sénéchal said.
Right now they have about 10 participants scheduled, but they have received more 90 calls in the past couple weeks. Sénéchal says they are still looking for people to join the younger group.
“We’re looking at two groups that will do the exact same kind of exercise and we’re going to look at a specific hormone called irisin and we want to see whether the response to exercise in terms of releasing that hormone during the exercise is going to be different, based on age,”Sénéchal said.
The hormone irisin was first discovered in 2012.
“There’s not a lot of good study about it. There’s some studies obviously because since 2012 there’s a couple of years there right, and a lot of researchers were kind of interested, but what it does is when you’re doing exercise you are having your muscles that are contracting, and when that happens it actually release that hormone,” he said.
“The muscle — like your biceps or what we call ‘skeletal muscles’ is actually an endocrine organ, so when it contracts it releases different hormones, including the irisin.”
Sénéchal says the release of the hormone targets fat masses and that leads to weight loss.
“We’re hoping to see if there is an increase with this hormone, and with the exercise and if so then we can..it gives an answer to people who are trying to say lose weight on what exact type of exercise they should be doing,” said student researcher Brittany Rioux, whi is working with Dr. Sénéchal. .
Participants take part in three one-hour sessions over the summer and track their fitness with an accelerometer at home. They undergo BMI testing, fitness and VO2 max tests, and well as have blood samples collected during their sessions.
Sénéchal says he hopes the study will reveal if exercise will help people lose weight, and for those who do respond to exercise, he says it would allow him to prescribe specific workouts for different people.
The study could also reveal if a diabetic person would be able to manage their symptoms well through exercise.
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