http://www.scienceinpublic.com.au/media-releases/2009-life-scientist Science communication in Australia and around the world Sun, 08 May 2011 09:21:51 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2 http://www.scienceinpublic.com.au/media-releases/2009-life-scientist/comment-page-1#comment-2765 Dr Rob Peers Fri, 13 Nov 2009 07:03:33 +0000 http://www.scienceinpublic.com/blog/?p=1460#comment-2765 Michael's work is very interesting and detailed, but he has yet to identify what drives some people to ignore appetite signals and just go on eating. Most general practitioners already know who these people are: overweight patients with anxiety disorder, which drives comfort-eating, and even binge-eating and Night Eating Syndrome. The combination of anxiety and a fatty diet (eg. chocolate or cakes) usually results in depression, because sat fats cause low-grade inflammation, which aggravates central stress pathways. Published studies suggest that the origins of anxiety may lie in pregnancy, when the maternal diet is fatty--this will slightly inflame the placenta, allowing maternal cortisol (a stress hormone) to reach the foetal brain, programming lifelong fear. The best treatment for anxiety, developed in Israel, is the seed sugar Inositol, which blocks fear circuits in the brain, shutting off the stress-activated reward system, thereby reducing cravings very rapidly. Most of my Inositol-treated overweight anxious patients lose 3-6 kg within a few weeks, some lose 10 kg, and one very large man has gone from 185 to 105 kg in 2 years. Inositol also increases muscle size and energy, which assists the exercise part of the treatment greatly. Deakin scientists have shown that Inositol activates a master gene for energy production--the same gene that is also activated by anti-ageing interventions like calorie restriction and resveratrol. Indeed, Inositol activates the same genes as long term caloric restriction. Therefore, any anxious comfort eater who follows a low-fat Inositol-rich diet (grains, nuts, legumes, citrus), perhaps with added Inositol supplement, will soon be calm and energetic, and gets an anti-ageing bonus as well! Michael’s work is very interesting and detailed, but he has yet to identify what drives some people to ignore appetite signals and just go on eating. Most general practitioners already know who these people are: overweight patients with anxiety disorder, which drives comfort-eating, and even binge-eating and Night Eating Syndrome. The combination of anxiety and a fatty diet (eg. chocolate or cakes) usually results in depression, because sat fats cause low-grade inflammation, which aggravates central stress pathways. Published studies suggest that the origins of anxiety may lie in pregnancy, when the maternal diet is fatty–this will slightly inflame the placenta, allowing maternal cortisol (a stress hormone) to reach the foetal brain, programming lifelong fear. The best treatment for anxiety, developed in Israel, is the seed sugar Inositol, which blocks fear circuits in the brain, shutting off the stress-activated reward system, thereby reducing cravings very rapidly. Most of my Inositol-treated overweight anxious patients lose 3-6 kg within a few weeks, some lose 10 kg, and one very large man has gone from 185 to 105 kg in 2 years. Inositol also increases muscle size and energy, which assists the exercise part of the treatment greatly. Deakin scientists have shown that Inositol activates a master gene for energy production–the same gene that is also activated by anti-ageing interventions like calorie restriction and resveratrol. Indeed, Inositol activates the same genes as long term caloric restriction. Therefore, any anxious comfort eater who follows a low-fat Inositol-rich diet (grains, nuts, legumes, citrus), perhaps with added Inositol supplement, will soon be calm and energetic, and gets an anti-ageing bonus as well!

]]> http://www.scienceinpublic.com.au/media-releases/2009-life-scientist/comment-page-1#comment-2546 Science in Public » Blog Archive » 2009 Prime Minister’s Prizes for Science Wed, 28 Oct 2009 06:14:57 +0000 http://www.scienceinpublic.com/blog/?p=1460#comment-2546 [...] Michael Cowley: Breaking the link between fat and diabetes [...] [...] Michael Cowley: Breaking the link between fat and diabetes [...]

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