August 18, 2009 • 22 mins
Sarcopenia is a form of muscle loss and coordination associated with aging. Luckily, a little extra effort can prevent its onset. Tune in to learn more about sarcopenia -- and how to prevent it -- in this podcast from HowStuffWorks.com.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.
It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know?
From how stuff works dot Com. Everybody loves altoy. It's
little ments that come intense. Well, once the ments are gone,
you can do some really neat things with the leftover tense.
(00:21):
People have made empty three players, cameras, even stoves. Check
out how stuff works dot com slash tent evators to
find out more. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm
Josh Clark. With me is always as Charles Bryant. I
don't even know why I say that. Chuck. I should
just go Josh and Chuck here, you get your thing.
(00:42):
This is a stupid intro. Chuck, let's start over. You
say that every week. Hey, and welcome to the podcast.
I'm Josh Clark. There's Chuck Bryant. This is stuff you
should know. Thanks for listening to us. Thank you, and
even hardier things would go out if people actually paid
for this. But still no, people like free Yeah, good
for them. Well yeah, well we're not charging for it.
(01:03):
If you're not. Everyone, I'm just saying right, and you
know what, think about that before you write in and
tell us. We're idiots. Yeah, we'll give you your money back.
Did you ever see that Simpsons where Bart goes off
on um that itchy and scratchy fan. No, where he's
actually talking about the Simpsons the guys like, I feel
like they owe me something as a loyal fan. I
think it was Comic book guy. He goes off on
(01:25):
and he goes, oh, really, they owe you something for
years and years of free programming entertainment that they provided
you no charge. That's what happens. Though. You know, people
will take ownership and I do the same thing. We
all do. It's nice to be owned. It's like lost sucks. Now,
how could you do that doesn't suck? I've never paid
any attention to it. Actually, I think this past season
was a return to for him, but the previous season
(01:46):
was a little lame. It happens. Moving on, moving on
to Sarcopenia. Well, speaking of aging aging television shows, yes,
we could also discuss aging human beings. Very nice, Josh,
that was that was clumsy? That got delivered by a
drunk pizza guy. Let's dish on Sarcopenia. I just like
(02:09):
that name. It's it's a good name. It is um
so Chuck. You know, there's some obvious signs of aging
as as we progress in our years. Especially it seems
like these days, once you start to hit the mid
to late seventies, all of a sudden, bam, you're like
half your height, stooped over, your rib cage is sunken
(02:29):
in like the guy from the Unforgiven Metallica video, sagging skin.
These are the signs of age, and you just kind
of take this for granted. I know I did until
I wrote this article. But it turns out that a
lot of this stuff can be prevented. And a lot
of these signs of aging are sarcopenia, which is age
(02:50):
related muscle loss. Right, And we just want to say
out there, if you are under forty, like many of
our listeners probably are, listen up because it will happen
YouTube and you can remember this one day and and
use it, or you can advise your parents and grandparents. Yeah. Well,
actually the whole reason this came up was because I
was talking to my dad about it. He just turned
(03:12):
seventy one and July four and um, he's starting to
he lost a bunch of weight. He's looking like Mr
Burt Reynolds these days. Um, a lot. Actually only mac though,
only the good stuff. Um. And he's but he's his
muscles are starting to actually because he's losing a bunch
of weight and he's advancing in age, but he's not
(03:34):
exercising as much. So I said, you know what, You're
at risk for sarcopania. And I'm going to look up
this article I wrote. And you were sitting next to me,
and you said, are we podcasting on that this week?
And I said, yes, we are, so here we are everyone.
That's how it happens to the back story. People always
wonder how we pick. That's how we pick sometimes. Yeah,
and the whole reason. Um, also because we do have
a fairly young listener ship. This can be prevented most
(03:58):
easily by starting. Yeah, starting you. So let's talk about sarcopane.
Let's talk about muscle loss first. Let's talk about muscle chuck. Protein. Yeah, yes,
muscle mass is protein basically the end, the end. And uh,
I like your how you said that in the article
that the body seeks stasis. So what you want is
(04:19):
that balance between the production and usage of that protein, right,
you don't want to overproduce. The body seeks stasis in
many many ways. Well, yeah, that's that's the that's the yeah,
that's that's the level that it's it's seeking at all
times with everything right, equilibrium, equilibrium body. It's a beautiful thing.
So chuck, um, muscle is obviously produced in the body.
(04:41):
We don't just you know, go buy a length of
muscle and insert it where we want it one day.
Yeah right yeah, um. We we actually can produce our
own um through non essential proteins. These are proteins that
the body produces its on its own. Right. Then we
have essential protein that we need to build muscle, and
(05:02):
we derived these by you know, jumping on gazelles and
eating their throats out, or just eating peanut butter and
things like that to contain on protein, tuna, tearing the
throat out of peanut butter. So we gotta tear the
throat of something to get muscle, right, and those are
essential proteins. You're right, right, you might have already said that.
I think I did, but it doesn't matter, buddy. Um.
(05:23):
So we take this protein, uh and and the stuff
we produce it's called synthesis, and the stuff we use
the not the essential proteins, that's metabolism. Right, um, And
we we never really lose our ability to metabolize proteins
as we age, but we do tend to lose our
ability to synthesize our own right. This is where you
(05:45):
wanted to get into hormones. Correct, you were just setting
me up all day long, buddy. Uh. Insulin like growth
hormone I g F one. Yeah, testosterone and growth hormone,
they all play a role in the product and of
the protein. Josh, did you know that I did? I
wrote this article. Well anyway, the point is these hormones, hormones,
(06:07):
you know, are the chemical messengers in our body. They
do all sorts of crazy stuff. I just wrote about, um,
whether or not you can get pregnant while you're breastfeeding.
And hormones are amazing. And by the way, I know
everything there is to know about the about the menstrual cycle.
You know everything. I'll ask me any question later, I'll
tell you many minarchy. The problem, Josh, is that the
(06:31):
pro these hormones decline as we age, right, So the
the the um the protein production is aren't getting it's
not getting the signals that it used to through the hormone,
so non essential protein production slips leaving only essential production
or I'm sorry, essential proteins that you ingest. And I
think you you indicated that as we get older, we
(06:52):
actually need more proteins. So that's kind of like a
one to punch, right, and we don't necessarily get more
proteins once you Once you establish a diet in your lifetime,
you usually kind of stick to it, especially in your
seventies and right. I mean people may you know, kind
of come to understand their bodies. I can't remember how
Douglas Copeland put it in. Generates an X, I think
(07:12):
aware of your body. People become aware of their bodies
later in life, so they may change their diet some
but generally, you're your protein intake will remain the same
even though you need it more. So you've got hormone
decline and protein deficiency. So that's two of the three.
Actually we didn't even mention the third yet. Well this
is the most this is the most vital one motor
(07:33):
unit restructuring. So you've got these three things, hormone decline,
protein deficiency, and motor unit um restructuring, which we were
about to get into, and all of a sudden, you've
got sarcopenia because you're stooped over. Your face is sagging again.
You look like the old guy from the Unforgiven video.
You're walking slow. What is the Unforgiven video? You know
(07:54):
that Metallica song Unforgiven. It came out post Good Metallica,
before Horrible Metallica. So it was during the after Ride,
the Lightning before whatever, that Lala Pellusa tour when they
started wearing eyeliner and stuff, when they cut their hair.
(08:16):
So we've got we've got sarcopenia um, but we haven't
really talked about that motor unit restructuring. This is the
most important factor, right, So let me tell them what
a motor unit is. Yes, So, Joshua, things called motor neurons,
and they command the muscle fibers to voluntary muscle fibers
voluntary muscifibers to do things. Right, So that's a motor
(08:37):
unit as those two things together, right, the muscle fibers
they command, and the neurons the muscle fibers and the
neurons that command them. That's a motor unit, right. And
and again it's strictly voluntary muscle we're talking about. So
the neuron gets a command from the brain. I think.
In the article I used the example of raised right
arm and punch chuck in the neck. I would never
do that. I'd say, shut up, brain. Um. So the
(09:01):
brain sends the signal to the neurons involved in raising
your right arm and they fire um and contract the muscles. Innervation,
which is what's going on, like you're lifting your arm.
It's really a bunch of muscles contracting. And when I
think about it like that, I think about like little
tiny like pirates, like pulling on the um, the hoisting,
(09:22):
the sale sure like that like he ho he, and
all of a sudden, your your your arm is raised.
Right there. You have it. It's called innervation. Technically, when
the muscle fibers are caused to contract from the neurons
right um, now raising your arm, that would be pretty
much probably exclusively the result of slow twitch neurons. Yeah,
(09:43):
lets we need to explain the difference here. There's two
kinds of neurons. There's fast twitch and they're slow twitch
ft and st and fast hitch fast twitch fast twitch fastitch.
I like fast twitch fast twitch. That's really hard to say.
Is it's like Irish wristwatch? Yeah, exactly. It's very specialized
because they command like only fast movements like when you run,
(10:08):
or like eye twitches your eyelids. Yeah, like really precise movement.
But there aren't as many of them because they only
command a certain you know, limited number of functions. Right. Well,
one one fast twitch neuron will command, um, say, just
a few muscle fibers because it has to be precise,
so it can't be concerned with a whole bunch at once.
Slight twitch, on the other hand, is uh the mass.
(10:30):
I think the way I put it in the article was, um,
the fast twitch neurons are kind of agile, like a
tightrope walker, where slow twitch or like bulls and China shops,
they're just kind of big and dumb and lumbering and brewer,
you know exactly. So the slow twitch neuron is going
to raise your arm because it's just a bunch of
(10:51):
just muscle fiber that isn't really involved in anything precise. Big.
The problem is that the ft the fast twitch, they
die off as you age, first the first to go.
So what happens is if if there if if a
group of muscle fibers are no longer commanded by a neuron,
(11:11):
they're at risk of um atrophying, right, which is muscle death. Right.
Uh so then all of a sudden you have muscle
loss to prevent this body has a pretty cool system.
This is very cool. Out of nowhere, Um, the closest
slow twitch neuron that's that's uh, the one that's closest
to the dead fast twitch neuron will take over, will
(11:34):
attach itself and take command in place of right. Yes,
so you still need these precise movements, but now it's
being um, they're being commanded by a big, dumb, lumbering neuron. Right.
So that is the restructuring. That's motor motor unit restructuring, right,
And the result of it is UM. You know if
a loss of coordination, UM, a loss of quick reaction, yes,
(11:58):
less precise right, So that's part of that UM, that
lack of balance that happens as you age. It's actually
the result of muscle loss, exactly. And that's part three
of the what you called the perfect storm that can
increase the onset of sarcopania. And when this happens, especially
along the spine, the muscle fibers along the spine, when
there's motor unit restructuring or just straight up neuron death, UM,
(12:22):
that's that's what gives us our stoop posture because the
stand upright, it requires muscles going he hoped right, and um,
when you lose it, you end up being stooped over.
So these all put together, all these signs of age,
the loss of the intercostal muscles between the ribs, stoop postures,
sagging skin, it's called senile sarcopania. And this is the
(12:42):
most preventable type of sarcopania. You can also get sarcopania
from um disease. There's some other much less preventable forms
of environmental conditions can sure Like basically, if you lay
down in a highway tunnel for several years and just
inhale carbon monoxide constantly, you're probably sarcopenia will be among
(13:05):
the various maladies that developed. Well, the good news though,
like you said, is that this can be prevented, and
this is the message that you need to talk to
your parents and grandparents about and what people like me
need to remember very soon as I am aging right,
And there's an easy solution to this waights resistance training.
So for a long time doctors well they still do,
(13:27):
but physicians UM have The medical establishment has always recommended
something like I think, um, thirty minutes of exercise a day.
It's all about cardio usually cardio like walking, running, wommen,
getting the heart going, and yeah you need to do that.
But that has little to no effect on sarcopenia. But
resistance training does. Um, And they've done a bunch of
(13:49):
studies on this. I found out this is one of
those articles, Chuck, where I wrote it and there was
just so much awesome information out there. There's just a
really interesting article to write despite when it was assigned
to me, and I found out with sarcopenia was I
was like, you gotta be kidding me, right, why would
I be writing this? Yeah, me of all people, Um,
I need to write about whiskey. But there there's been
a bunch of studies that have turned up some really
(14:11):
surprising results. Right. So um, there was one that I
came across that put a group of elderly people age
eighty four. Yeah, this is pretty impressive unresistance training. And
by resistance training, we're talking about um, oh, I don't know.
You know where you lift legs weights with your legs
by just like flexing them out where I can't remember.
(14:31):
I don't know what it's called like bringing your I've
done it before, probably a doubt. If they recommend that
the elderly go in there and start hitting the bench press. No,
as a matter of fact, they recommend that the elderly
not try this first by themselves. They need at the
very least the advice of somebody who knows what they're
(14:51):
talking about at the gym, who works at the gym,
and they're not a personal trainer. You want to talk
to your doctor first if you're if you're elderly, but
we're The point here is is that if you are
elderly and you are developing circopania, it can actually be
reversed by resistance training. It was like, these signs of
aging can be reversed. Um. These this this study that
(15:13):
had seventy eight to eighty four year olds. They put
them on a resistance training program um and they saw
an increase of protein synthesis. Remember that's the stuff that
we that's the ability with los as we get older.
The increase was a hundred and eighty two percent. That's unreal.
That's huge because normally there's like increases and whenever you
look at a study it's like, oh, there was a
(15:34):
two percent change. That's significant different, This is enormously significant.
Just by doing weights, we can synthesize protein, right, yeah,
I can I tell them about the other one. Please do? Uh.
The U s d A did this one and they
said that the elderly participants who did resistance training for
forty five minutes three times a week saw for twelve
(15:55):
week over three month spans, on average, increase of thirty
muscle five increase in strength. Yeah, and that's huge, man,
that's forty five minutes three times a week in twelve weeks.
It's nothing. No, not much. And if you're seventy or eighty,
what else do you're not working? Yeah? Get the gym? Yeah,
Wapner commands you should we talk about astronauts well this Yeah,
(16:18):
I was hoping we get to this. The whole the
whole reason that we know that resistance training works is
thanks to our friends at NASA. This is weird, man.
What happens is astronauts have a similar existence as elderly
because it's very sedentary. They're in a space shuttle and
there's not much room. They're waitless. They're just hanging around,
drinking tang doing nothing. They never did nothing. For nobody.
(16:40):
Here's the interesting thing, Josher's and I know you know this.
They have an opposite effect. They're slow twitch. Well weightlessness,
weightlessness does well yeah, not not just if you're an astronaut,
but yeah, being being waitless. Uh, the fast twitch ones actually, uh,
the slow twitch ones dial first and in the fast
(17:00):
which ones to pick up the slack right rather than
down here on Earth where the fast twitched size off
first and then slow twitch picks up. And I've heard
of this. I didn't know the science behind it, but
I had heard that if you're weightless in space, like
these people that are up there for like a year
at the space station are coming back and like tearing
calf muscles, Like, yeah, that's the result of it. It's
not a loss of coordination, but very easily torn muscles
(17:23):
because the little the little precise, uh, fast twitch neurons
are not used to controlling like these huge you know,
they don't do the heave hoe that well. Yeah, so
that's to work this all out, if you know, and
outer space one day. Yeah. And I think the last
point is is, yes, you're supposed to do cardio. You're
supposed to do the thirty minutes of walking every day
to stay alive and all that. But the point is
(17:45):
is you can't walk. If you can't stand up straight right,
you can't walk away your sarcopanian. So you want to
you want to do the resistance training first. You want
to start on that. You want to start that regimen
first and then move into walking. And again, if you're
twelve years old and you're listening to us, you have
no idea how this applies to you, But my friends,
(18:06):
it does. Sarah, Sarah are no, she's twelve. This does
apply to you, just as it applies to Chuck and I.
And let's go hit the gym, buddy. Let's do it. Yeah, you,
me and Arnie mh so Chuck uh and if anybody
wants to, this is one of those articles that would
be good to kind of print out and a half
around to refer to. I think there's some really good
(18:29):
links on Lots More Information page to give you more information,
lots more information, uh that you can find that article
by typing in sarcopenia. That's s A R C O
P E N I A UH in the handy toolbar
at how stuff works dot com. And uh, before we
do listener mail Chuck, let's do a little plug. Yeah,
(18:49):
we don't. We haven't plugged ourselves in a long long time.
We're not big on tuting our own horns now. So
we're going to plug our blog, which we haven't done
in a while. And you can go to the house
stuff Works dot com website. Yeah, go to the blogs.
You'll see it over on the right side, the blogs
of how stuff Work. Yep, there's a there's a lot
of people that blogs who we have seven eight nine now, yeah,
and they're all really great act they are. We have
(19:09):
um our Tracy, our colleague, Tracy Wilson writes fans stuff.
It's all about geek dumb um. Katie does the history
stuff blog. Yeah, Stuffy missed in history class. I should say.
Scott's over there with auto stuff Science. We've got the
Holster Banks trickling in the gang with tech stuff. The
brain does one. Yeah, um, but yeah, you can find
(19:31):
all of them at the blogs at how stuff Works
dot com and um, I think it's blogs dot how
stuff works dot com right or the home Should we
plug that webcast? Definitely. We haven't plugged this in a
long time because we were not too sure of ourselves
at first with the webcast. But we do what we are.
We are we now, when did that happen? I think
it's good. Okay. Uh. We do a webcast every Wednesday
(19:53):
at one o'clock Eastern Standard time, and it's it's live.
It's live video without a net and it's pretty clear
that it's live when you see as stumble through certain
things and what not. Not this week or last week,
the week before, we actually started over like five minutes
into it, did we remember? It got so out of
hand We're just like, let's just start over. I don't
(20:13):
even remember. It was. Wow. It's a lot of fun though,
and it's a little different than the show. It's a
little more news oriented. We talked about current events, and
we don't cannibalize the podcast, no, not at all. So
it's it's fun and you can watch that on our blog. Actually. Yeah,
so that's our webcast and the blog, which means plug
time is over and that means listener mail. That's right, Josh.
(20:39):
I'm just gonna call this it made me feel good
and it's from Omaha. That's a great title. I always
think of these on the fly, and you understand, Dear
Josh and Chuck I've been meaning to write you and
the History Stuff gals for a long time now for
helping me survive horrendous long international plane trips for work.
I save up a bunch of podcasts and listen to
(20:59):
them to keep out the noise of strangers exchanging small
talk and baby screaming, and to take my mind off
my anxiety and border However, now I really have something
to thank you for. Friday, I got back from a
trip to Brazil uh and, during which I listened to
the podcast on Tako and other parasites prevalent in Brazil
Lovely uh And the next day I had to put
(21:20):
my beloved bunny of nine years to sleep. It's awful.
Is that related to toxo? Not at all, um, I
have been heartbroken. It's very sad. Yesterday, driving home from work,
I played a couple of your podcasts I hadn't listened
to on my trip and found myself laughing out loud.
I was amazing. I hadn't felt like laughing or even
smiling for days, and you two cheered me up more
(21:40):
than I thought was possible. Awesome. Sure, you didn't save
my life or anything like you did with the hypermiling woman,
But you certainly help my emotional state for that. I
thank you. Keep up the great humor. I'm sure it
helps more than helps people. More than you know. Is
from grim and Elmahaa Braska Brim. Yeah, awesome, and that
awesome name the last name or a name or stuffing
(22:01):
she had a different name and that she can't say
it on the yere Oh, I got you. You know,
we don't say full name. Did you give her that nickname? No? No, no,
that's how she signed it, But then her full name
was I got it there as well. Well, that's fantastic. Yeah,
made it made me feel good. Well, if you have
any stories about how we made you feel better about
a dead pet or any international travel you'd like to
tell us about, you can send that in an email
(22:23):
to stuff Podcast at how stuff works dot com. For
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com home page. Brought to you by the reinvented two
(22:46):
thousand twelve camera. It's ready, are you
Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.
It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff you should know?
From how stuff works dot Com. Everybody loves altoy. It's
little ments that come intense. Well, once the ments are gone,
you can do some really neat things with the leftover tense.
(00:21):
People have made empty three players, cameras, even stoves. Check
out how stuff works dot com slash tent evators to
find out more. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm
Josh Clark. With me is always as Charles Bryant. I
don't even know why I say that. Chuck. I should
just go Josh and Chuck here, you get your thing.
(00:42):
This is a stupid intro. Chuck, let's start over. You
say that every week. Hey, and welcome to the podcast.
I'm Josh Clark. There's Chuck Bryant. This is stuff you
should know. Thanks for listening to us. Thank you, and
even hardier things would go out if people actually paid
for this. But still no, people like free Yeah, good
for them. Well yeah, well we're not charging for it.
(01:03):
If you're not. Everyone, I'm just saying right, and you
know what, think about that before you write in and
tell us. We're idiots. Yeah, we'll give you your money back.
Did you ever see that Simpsons where Bart goes off
on um that itchy and scratchy fan. No, where he's
actually talking about the Simpsons the guys like, I feel
like they owe me something as a loyal fan. I
think it was Comic book guy. He goes off on
(01:25):
and he goes, oh, really, they owe you something for
years and years of free programming entertainment that they provided
you no charge. That's what happens. Though. You know, people
will take ownership and I do the same thing. We
all do. It's nice to be owned. It's like lost sucks. Now,
how could you do that doesn't suck? I've never paid
any attention to it. Actually, I think this past season
was a return to for him, but the previous season
(01:46):
was a little lame. It happens. Moving on, moving on
to Sarcopenia. Well, speaking of aging aging television shows, yes,
we could also discuss aging human beings. Very nice, Josh,
that was that was clumsy? That got delivered by a
drunk pizza guy. Let's dish on Sarcopenia. I just like
(02:09):
that name. It's it's a good name. It is um
so Chuck. You know, there's some obvious signs of aging
as as we progress in our years. Especially it seems
like these days, once you start to hit the mid
to late seventies, all of a sudden, bam, you're like
half your height, stooped over, your rib cage is sunken
(02:29):
in like the guy from the Unforgiven Metallica video, sagging skin.
These are the signs of age, and you just kind
of take this for granted. I know I did until
I wrote this article. But it turns out that a
lot of this stuff can be prevented. And a lot
of these signs of aging are sarcopenia, which is age
(02:50):
related muscle loss. Right, And we just want to say
out there, if you are under forty, like many of
our listeners probably are, listen up because it will happen
YouTube and you can remember this one day and and
use it, or you can advise your parents and grandparents. Yeah. Well,
actually the whole reason this came up was because I
was talking to my dad about it. He just turned
(03:12):
seventy one and July four and um, he's starting to
he lost a bunch of weight. He's looking like Mr
Burt Reynolds these days. Um, a lot. Actually only mac though,
only the good stuff. Um. And he's but he's his
muscles are starting to actually because he's losing a bunch
of weight and he's advancing in age, but he's not
(03:34):
exercising as much. So I said, you know what, You're
at risk for sarcopania. And I'm going to look up
this article I wrote. And you were sitting next to me,
and you said, are we podcasting on that this week?
And I said, yes, we are, so here we are everyone.
That's how it happens to the back story. People always
wonder how we pick. That's how we pick sometimes. Yeah,
and the whole reason. Um, also because we do have
a fairly young listener ship. This can be prevented most
(03:58):
easily by starting. Yeah, starting you. So let's talk about sarcopane.
Let's talk about muscle loss first. Let's talk about muscle chuck. Protein. Yeah, yes,
muscle mass is protein basically the end, the end. And uh,
I like your how you said that in the article
that the body seeks stasis. So what you want is
(04:19):
that balance between the production and usage of that protein, right,
you don't want to overproduce. The body seeks stasis in
many many ways. Well, yeah, that's that's the that's the yeah,
that's that's the level that it's it's seeking at all
times with everything right, equilibrium, equilibrium body. It's a beautiful thing.
So chuck, um, muscle is obviously produced in the body.
(04:41):
We don't just you know, go buy a length of
muscle and insert it where we want it one day.
Yeah right yeah, um. We we actually can produce our
own um through non essential proteins. These are proteins that
the body produces its on its own. Right. Then we
have essential protein that we need to build muscle, and
(05:02):
we derived these by you know, jumping on gazelles and
eating their throats out, or just eating peanut butter and
things like that to contain on protein, tuna, tearing the
throat out of peanut butter. So we gotta tear the
throat of something to get muscle, right, and those are
essential proteins. You're right, right, you might have already said that.
I think I did, but it doesn't matter, buddy. Um.
(05:23):
So we take this protein, uh and and the stuff
we produce it's called synthesis, and the stuff we use
the not the essential proteins, that's metabolism. Right, um, And
we we never really lose our ability to metabolize proteins
as we age, but we do tend to lose our
ability to synthesize our own right. This is where you
(05:45):
wanted to get into hormones. Correct, you were just setting
me up all day long, buddy. Uh. Insulin like growth
hormone I g F one. Yeah, testosterone and growth hormone,
they all play a role in the product and of
the protein. Josh, did you know that I did? I
wrote this article. Well anyway, the point is these hormones, hormones,
(06:07):
you know, are the chemical messengers in our body. They
do all sorts of crazy stuff. I just wrote about, um,
whether or not you can get pregnant while you're breastfeeding.
And hormones are amazing. And by the way, I know
everything there is to know about the about the menstrual cycle.
You know everything. I'll ask me any question later, I'll
tell you many minarchy. The problem, Josh, is that the
(06:31):
pro these hormones decline as we age, right, So the
the the um the protein production is aren't getting it's
not getting the signals that it used to through the hormone,
so non essential protein production slips leaving only essential production
or I'm sorry, essential proteins that you ingest. And I
think you you indicated that as we get older, we
(06:52):
actually need more proteins. So that's kind of like a
one to punch, right, and we don't necessarily get more
proteins once you Once you establish a diet in your lifetime,
you usually kind of stick to it, especially in your
seventies and right. I mean people may you know, kind
of come to understand their bodies. I can't remember how
Douglas Copeland put it in. Generates an X, I think
(07:12):
aware of your body. People become aware of their bodies
later in life, so they may change their diet some
but generally, you're your protein intake will remain the same
even though you need it more. So you've got hormone
decline and protein deficiency. So that's two of the three.
Actually we didn't even mention the third yet. Well this
is the most this is the most vital one motor
(07:33):
unit restructuring. So you've got these three things, hormone decline,
protein deficiency, and motor unit um restructuring, which we were
about to get into, and all of a sudden, you've
got sarcopenia because you're stooped over. Your face is sagging again.
You look like the old guy from the Unforgiven video.
You're walking slow. What is the Unforgiven video? You know
(07:54):
that Metallica song Unforgiven. It came out post Good Metallica,
before Horrible Metallica. So it was during the after Ride,
the Lightning before whatever, that Lala Pellusa tour when they
started wearing eyeliner and stuff, when they cut their hair.
(08:16):
So we've got we've got sarcopenia um, but we haven't
really talked about that motor unit restructuring. This is the
most important factor, right, So let me tell them what
a motor unit is. Yes, So, Joshua, things called motor neurons,
and they command the muscle fibers to voluntary muscle fibers
voluntary muscifibers to do things. Right, So that's a motor
(08:37):
unit as those two things together, right, the muscle fibers
they command, and the neurons the muscle fibers and the
neurons that command them. That's a motor unit, right. And
and again it's strictly voluntary muscle we're talking about. So
the neuron gets a command from the brain. I think.
In the article I used the example of raised right
arm and punch chuck in the neck. I would never
do that. I'd say, shut up, brain. Um. So the
(09:01):
brain sends the signal to the neurons involved in raising
your right arm and they fire um and contract the muscles. Innervation,
which is what's going on, like you're lifting your arm.
It's really a bunch of muscles contracting. And when I
think about it like that, I think about like little
tiny like pirates, like pulling on the um, the hoisting,
(09:22):
the sale sure like that like he ho he, and
all of a sudden, your your your arm is raised.
Right there. You have it. It's called innervation. Technically, when
the muscle fibers are caused to contract from the neurons
right um, now raising your arm, that would be pretty
much probably exclusively the result of slow twitch neurons. Yeah,
(09:43):
lets we need to explain the difference here. There's two
kinds of neurons. There's fast twitch and they're slow twitch
ft and st and fast hitch fast twitch fast twitch fastitch.
I like fast twitch fast twitch. That's really hard to say.
Is it's like Irish wristwatch? Yeah, exactly. It's very specialized
because they command like only fast movements like when you run,
(10:08):
or like eye twitches your eyelids. Yeah, like really precise movement.
But there aren't as many of them because they only
command a certain you know, limited number of functions. Right. Well,
one one fast twitch neuron will command, um, say, just
a few muscle fibers because it has to be precise,
so it can't be concerned with a whole bunch at once.
Slight twitch, on the other hand, is uh the mass.
(10:30):
I think the way I put it in the article was, um,
the fast twitch neurons are kind of agile, like a
tightrope walker, where slow twitch or like bulls and China shops,
they're just kind of big and dumb and lumbering and brewer,
you know exactly. So the slow twitch neuron is going
to raise your arm because it's just a bunch of
(10:51):
just muscle fiber that isn't really involved in anything precise. Big.
The problem is that the ft the fast twitch, they
die off as you age, first the first to go.
So what happens is if if there if if a
group of muscle fibers are no longer commanded by a neuron,
(11:11):
they're at risk of um atrophying, right, which is muscle death. Right.
Uh so then all of a sudden you have muscle
loss to prevent this body has a pretty cool system.
This is very cool. Out of nowhere, Um, the closest
slow twitch neuron that's that's uh, the one that's closest
to the dead fast twitch neuron will take over, will
(11:34):
attach itself and take command in place of right. Yes,
so you still need these precise movements, but now it's
being um, they're being commanded by a big, dumb, lumbering neuron. Right.
So that is the restructuring. That's motor motor unit restructuring, right,
And the result of it is UM. You know if
a loss of coordination, UM, a loss of quick reaction, yes,
(11:58):
less precise right, So that's part of that UM, that
lack of balance that happens as you age. It's actually
the result of muscle loss, exactly. And that's part three
of the what you called the perfect storm that can
increase the onset of sarcopania. And when this happens, especially
along the spine, the muscle fibers along the spine, when
there's motor unit restructuring or just straight up neuron death, UM,
(12:22):
that's that's what gives us our stoop posture because the
stand upright, it requires muscles going he hoped right, and um,
when you lose it, you end up being stooped over.
So these all put together, all these signs of age,
the loss of the intercostal muscles between the ribs, stoop postures,
sagging skin, it's called senile sarcopania. And this is the
(12:42):
most preventable type of sarcopania. You can also get sarcopania
from um disease. There's some other much less preventable forms
of environmental conditions can sure Like basically, if you lay
down in a highway tunnel for several years and just
inhale carbon monoxide constantly, you're probably sarcopenia will be among
(13:05):
the various maladies that developed. Well, the good news though,
like you said, is that this can be prevented, and
this is the message that you need to talk to
your parents and grandparents about and what people like me
need to remember very soon as I am aging right,
And there's an easy solution to this waights resistance training.
So for a long time doctors well they still do,
(13:27):
but physicians UM have The medical establishment has always recommended
something like I think, um, thirty minutes of exercise a day.
It's all about cardio usually cardio like walking, running, wommen,
getting the heart going, and yeah you need to do that.
But that has little to no effect on sarcopenia. But
resistance training does. Um, And they've done a bunch of
(13:49):
studies on this. I found out this is one of
those articles, Chuck, where I wrote it and there was
just so much awesome information out there. There's just a
really interesting article to write despite when it was assigned
to me, and I found out with sarcopenia was I
was like, you gotta be kidding me, right, why would
I be writing this? Yeah, me of all people, Um,
I need to write about whiskey. But there there's been
a bunch of studies that have turned up some really
(14:11):
surprising results. Right. So um, there was one that I
came across that put a group of elderly people age
eighty four. Yeah, this is pretty impressive unresistance training. And
by resistance training, we're talking about um, oh, I don't know.
You know where you lift legs weights with your legs
by just like flexing them out where I can't remember.
(14:31):
I don't know what it's called like bringing your I've
done it before, probably a doubt. If they recommend that
the elderly go in there and start hitting the bench press. No,
as a matter of fact, they recommend that the elderly
not try this first by themselves. They need at the
very least the advice of somebody who knows what they're
(14:51):
talking about at the gym, who works at the gym,
and they're not a personal trainer. You want to talk
to your doctor first if you're if you're elderly, but
we're The point here is is that if you are
elderly and you are developing circopania, it can actually be
reversed by resistance training. It was like, these signs of
aging can be reversed. Um. These this this study that
(15:13):
had seventy eight to eighty four year olds. They put
them on a resistance training program um and they saw
an increase of protein synthesis. Remember that's the stuff that
we that's the ability with los as we get older.
The increase was a hundred and eighty two percent. That's unreal.
That's huge because normally there's like increases and whenever you
look at a study it's like, oh, there was a
(15:34):
two percent change. That's significant different, This is enormously significant.
Just by doing weights, we can synthesize protein, right, yeah,
I can I tell them about the other one. Please do? Uh.
The U s d A did this one and they
said that the elderly participants who did resistance training for
forty five minutes three times a week saw for twelve
(15:55):
week over three month spans, on average, increase of thirty
muscle five increase in strength. Yeah, and that's huge, man,
that's forty five minutes three times a week in twelve weeks.
It's nothing. No, not much. And if you're seventy or eighty,
what else do you're not working? Yeah? Get the gym? Yeah,
Wapner commands you should we talk about astronauts well this Yeah,
(16:18):
I was hoping we get to this. The whole the
whole reason that we know that resistance training works is
thanks to our friends at NASA. This is weird, man.
What happens is astronauts have a similar existence as elderly
because it's very sedentary. They're in a space shuttle and
there's not much room. They're waitless. They're just hanging around,
drinking tang doing nothing. They never did nothing. For nobody.
(16:40):
Here's the interesting thing, Josher's and I know you know this.
They have an opposite effect. They're slow twitch. Well weightlessness,
weightlessness does well yeah, not not just if you're an astronaut,
but yeah, being being waitless. Uh, the fast twitch ones actually, uh,
the slow twitch ones dial first and in the fast
(17:00):
which ones to pick up the slack right rather than
down here on Earth where the fast twitched size off
first and then slow twitch picks up. And I've heard
of this. I didn't know the science behind it, but
I had heard that if you're weightless in space, like
these people that are up there for like a year
at the space station are coming back and like tearing
calf muscles, Like, yeah, that's the result of it. It's
not a loss of coordination, but very easily torn muscles
(17:23):
because the little the little precise, uh, fast twitch neurons
are not used to controlling like these huge you know,
they don't do the heave hoe that well. Yeah, so
that's to work this all out, if you know, and
outer space one day. Yeah. And I think the last
point is is, yes, you're supposed to do cardio. You're
supposed to do the thirty minutes of walking every day
to stay alive and all that. But the point is
(17:45):
is you can't walk. If you can't stand up straight right,
you can't walk away your sarcopanian. So you want to
you want to do the resistance training first. You want
to start on that. You want to start that regimen
first and then move into walking. And again, if you're
twelve years old and you're listening to us, you have
no idea how this applies to you, But my friends,
(18:06):
it does. Sarah, Sarah are no, she's twelve. This does
apply to you, just as it applies to Chuck and I.
And let's go hit the gym, buddy. Let's do it. Yeah, you,
me and Arnie mh so Chuck uh and if anybody
wants to, this is one of those articles that would
be good to kind of print out and a half
around to refer to. I think there's some really good
(18:29):
links on Lots More Information page to give you more information,
lots more information, uh that you can find that article
by typing in sarcopenia. That's s A R C O
P E N I A UH in the handy toolbar
at how stuff works dot com. And uh, before we
do listener mail Chuck, let's do a little plug. Yeah,
(18:49):
we don't. We haven't plugged ourselves in a long long time.
We're not big on tuting our own horns now. So
we're going to plug our blog, which we haven't done
in a while. And you can go to the house
stuff Works dot com website. Yeah, go to the blogs.
You'll see it over on the right side, the blogs
of how stuff Work. Yep, there's a there's a lot
of people that blogs who we have seven eight nine now, yeah,
and they're all really great act they are. We have
(19:09):
um our Tracy, our colleague, Tracy Wilson writes fans stuff.
It's all about geek dumb um. Katie does the history
stuff blog. Yeah, Stuffy missed in history class. I should say.
Scott's over there with auto stuff Science. We've got the
Holster Banks trickling in the gang with tech stuff. The
brain does one. Yeah, um, but yeah, you can find
(19:31):
all of them at the blogs at how stuff Works
dot com and um, I think it's blogs dot how
stuff works dot com right or the home Should we
plug that webcast? Definitely. We haven't plugged this in a
long time because we were not too sure of ourselves
at first with the webcast. But we do what we are.
We are we now, when did that happen? I think
it's good. Okay. Uh. We do a webcast every Wednesday
(19:53):
at one o'clock Eastern Standard time, and it's it's live.
It's live video without a net and it's pretty clear
that it's live when you see as stumble through certain
things and what not. Not this week or last week,
the week before, we actually started over like five minutes
into it, did we remember? It got so out of
hand We're just like, let's just start over. I don't
(20:13):
even remember. It was. Wow. It's a lot of fun though,
and it's a little different than the show. It's a
little more news oriented. We talked about current events, and
we don't cannibalize the podcast, no, not at all. So
it's it's fun and you can watch that on our blog. Actually. Yeah,
so that's our webcast and the blog, which means plug
time is over and that means listener mail. That's right, Josh.
(20:39):
I'm just gonna call this it made me feel good
and it's from Omaha. That's a great title. I always
think of these on the fly, and you understand, Dear
Josh and Chuck I've been meaning to write you and
the History Stuff gals for a long time now for
helping me survive horrendous long international plane trips for work.
I save up a bunch of podcasts and listen to
(20:59):
them to keep out the noise of strangers exchanging small
talk and baby screaming, and to take my mind off
my anxiety and border However, now I really have something
to thank you for. Friday, I got back from a
trip to Brazil uh and, during which I listened to
the podcast on Tako and other parasites prevalent in Brazil
Lovely uh And the next day I had to put
(21:20):
my beloved bunny of nine years to sleep. It's awful.
Is that related to toxo? Not at all, um, I
have been heartbroken. It's very sad. Yesterday, driving home from work,
I played a couple of your podcasts I hadn't listened
to on my trip and found myself laughing out loud.
I was amazing. I hadn't felt like laughing or even
smiling for days, and you two cheered me up more
(21:40):
than I thought was possible. Awesome. Sure, you didn't save
my life or anything like you did with the hypermiling woman,
But you certainly help my emotional state for that. I
thank you. Keep up the great humor. I'm sure it
helps more than helps people. More than you know. Is
from grim and Elmahaa Braska Brim. Yeah, awesome, and that
awesome name the last name or a name or stuffing
(22:01):
she had a different name and that she can't say
it on the yere Oh, I got you. You know,
we don't say full name. Did you give her that nickname? No? No, no,
that's how she signed it, But then her full name
was I got it there as well. Well, that's fantastic. Yeah,
made it made me feel good. Well, if you have
any stories about how we made you feel better about
a dead pet or any international travel you'd like to
tell us about, you can send that in an email
(22:23):
to stuff Podcast at how stuff works dot com. For
more on this and thousands of other topics, does it
how stuff works dot com. Want more how stuff works,
check out our blogs on the house stuff works dot
com home page. Brought to you by the reinvented two
(22:46):
thousand twelve camera. It's ready, are you
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Chuck Bryant
Josh Clark
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