Most of the hibernator-associated changes in the genome appeared to \u201cbreak\u201d the function of specific pieces of DNA, rather than confer a new function. This hints that hibernators may have lost constraints that would otherwise prevent extreme flexibility in the ability to control metabolism. In other words, it\u2019s possible that the human \u201cthermostat\u201d is locked to a narrow range of continuous energy consumption. For hibernators, that lock may be gone.<\/p>\n
Hibernators can reverse neurodegeneration, avoid muscle atrophy, stay healthy despite massive weight fluctuations, and show improved aging and longevity. The researchers think their findings show that humans may already have the needed genetic code to have similar hibernator-like superpowers\u2014if we can bypass some of our metabolic switches.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cHumans already have the genetic framework,\u201d Steinwand says. \u201cWe just need to identify the control switches for these hibernator traits.\u201d By learning how, researchers could help confer similar resilience to humans.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s potentially an opportunity\u2014by understanding these hibernation-linked mechanisms in the genome\u2014to find strategies to intervene and help with age-related diseases,\u201d Gregg says. \u201cIf that\u2019s hidden in the genome that we\u2019ve already got, we could learn from hibernators to improve our own health.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Most of the hibernator-associated changes in the genome appeared to \u201cbreak\u201d the function of specific pieces of DNA,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":35267,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[377,85,46,141],"class_list":["post-35266","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-genetics","tag-genetics","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35266","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35266"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35266\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35267"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35266"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35266"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35266"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}