FLICKR, JOINT BASE LEWIS MCCHORD
Exercise can delay the onset of diabetes by boosting the expression of genes involved in muscle oxidation and glucose regulation. A new study, published today (March 6) in Cell Metabolism, suggests that DNA methylation drives some of these changes, and that they can occur within just a few hours of exercise, providing a potential mechanism for how exercise protects the body from metabolic disease.
“It’s one of the first studies that really proves that DNA methylation can affect things in a very short timeframe,” said Marloes Dekker Nitert, who studies diabetes epigenetics at Lund University in Sweden and was not involved in the research.
People with type 2 diabetes are less responsive to insulin than healthy individuals, and thus have difficulties maintaining normal blood sugar ...
