Exercises, fitness, and regular physical activity – all part of every day’s modern conscientious lifestyle – continue to draw attention in the medical world in making precision what do they mean to our bodies.

Those who have to walk, like to walk, or choose walking as an exercise may like to take note of a Kyoto University recommendation that walking up to 9,000 steps every day can maximise your fitness.

9,000 steps are equivalent to about 6.3 km and could take two hours to complete.

Few of us, especially who have to work would have two hours to spare. But no worry, the study says the more steps you take, there are greater health benefits, but they will peak at 9,000 steps.

Across the Far East to Yale University, five of its Department of Internal Medicine specialists found that advantages of exercise go beyond physical fitness and cardiovascular health as most of us know.

First, exercise can reverse muscle insulin resistance. 

Insulin resistance in skeletal muscle is a major factor in the pathogenesis of type 2 diabetes, fatty liver disease, heart disease, and obesity-associated cancers. 

Second, exercise can help mitigate these risks and boost the odds of a speedy recovery. For many infections, such as influenza, COVID-19, and RSV, comorbidities such as obesity, diabetes, and poor respiratory health are all major contributors to severe disease. Exercise can help mitigate these risks and boost the odds of a speedy recovery.

Third, there is evidence that light to moderate aerobic exercise, like walking or jogging, can help the immune system work better.

People who regularly get this type of exercise get sick less frequently than people who are sedentary. This could be because several types of immune cells have been shown to work better shortly after exercise.

Fourth, evidence suggests that exercise leads to a more diverse gut microbiome and an increase in butyrate, a short-chain fatty acid that may prevent diseases.

Butyrate is one of the key fuels that the cells lining the colon need to grow, divide, and stay healthy, and higher levels of butyrate can reduce the severity of inflammatory bowel disease and the risk of colon cancer, as well as general inflammation.

Finally, exercise improves sleep. Exercise is an external cue to your circadian clock, sending a physiologic message that lets your brain and body know when it is time to be awake versus when it is time to sleep.

Regular physical activity also contributes to better physical and mental health, decreasing the risk of developing sleep problems and potentially improving existing sleep problems.

Meanwhile, on the West Coast at Stanford University, a huge study has begun to find out how regularly puffing away on a treadmill, biking up a steep hill or going for a brisk lunchtime walk confer an array of health benefits?

Researchers conducted nearly 10,000 measurements in nearly 20 types of tissues to uncover the effect of eight weeks of endurance exercise in laboratory rats trained to run on rodent-sized treadmills.

Their results highlight striking effects of exercise on the immune system, stress response, energy production and metabolism. They uncovered significant links between exercise, molecules and genes.

“We all know exercise is beneficial for us,” professor of pathology Stephen Montgomery, says. “But we don’t know much about the molecular signals that manifest across the body when people exercise, or how they may change when people train”. 

This study is the first to take a holistic, body-wide look at molecular changes, from proteins to genes to metabolites to fats and energy production. It’s the broadest profiling yet of the effects of exercise, and it creates an essential map to how it changes the body.

Although the study served primarily to create a database for future analysis, some interesting nuggets vaulted to the top. 

First, they noted that the expression of 22 genes changed with exercise in all six of the tissues they focused on. Many of these genes were involved in what are known as heat shock pathways, which stabilize the structure of proteins when cells undergo stress including changes in temperature (feel that burn?), infection or tissue remodeling (hello new muscle fibers!). 

Others have been implicated in pathways that reduce blood pressure and increase the body’s sensitivity to insulin, which lowers blood sugar levels.

The researchers also noted that the expression of several genes involved in Type 2 diabetes, heart disease, obesity and kidney disease was reduced in exercising rats as compared with their sedentary counterparts — a clear link between their studies and human health.

Stay tune!