Exercise in a pill? Researchers find two

Researchers who genetically engineered "marathon mice" that could run for hours have found two pills that can mimic the effects -- and they have already developed a test for the drugs in case athletes try to cheat with them.The drugs reproduce many of the biological benefits of exercise, helping cells burn fat better and boosting endurance, said Ronald Evans, a Howard Hughes Medical Institute researcher at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in California.

One of the pills may some day help people enhance their exercise or training, while the other might be more suited for couch potatoes who need to kick-start themselves, Evans and colleagues reported on Thursday in the journal Cell.

"If you like exercise, you like the idea of getting more bang for your buck," Evans said in a statement. "If you don’t like exercise, you love the idea of getting the benefits from a pill."

In 2004, Evans and his colleagues genetically engineered mice by tweaking a gene called PPAR-delta, a master regulator of different genes. Gene-engineered mice could run twice as far as normal mice and stayed lean even when fed a high-fat diet.

The next step was to find a drug that might mimic these effects.

Evans tested a compound called GW1516, one of a family of compounds that researchers are looking at as obesity and diabetes drugs. But even though it affected the genes of the mice, it did not affect their metabolism.

"There was no change at all in running performance. Nothing -- not even a percent," Evans said in a statement.

MIMICKING LIFE

Then the researchers thought about what happens in real life.

"If you’re out of shape -- and most of us are -- and you want to change, you have to do some exercise. The way we reprogram muscle in adults is by training."

So they trained the mice while some were on the drug and others were not.

All the mice became more athletic but those given GW1516 ran 68 percent longer than those that had only done the exercise training. "The dramatic effect of the drug was stunning," Evans said.

But that does not help people who might have muscle-wasting diseases, fatigue, or who are too overweight to exercise.

They went back to see if there was a different way to affect PPAR-delta. One compound that is well understood already is AMP-activate protein kinase or AMPK, "a master regulator of cellular and organismal metabolism", they wrote.

"We think AMPK activity is the secret to allowing PPAR-delta drugs to work," Evans said.

A drug called AICAR mimics AMP, Evans said, "so muscle thinks it’s burning fat."

Mice given AICAR ran 44 percent longer than untreated animals, the researchers found.

"This is a drug that is like pharmacological exercise," Evans says. "After four weeks of receiving the drug, the mice were behaving as if they’d been exercised."

Treated mice could outrun mice given traditional exercise training, Evans said.

"Almost no one gets the recommended 40 minutes to an hour per day of exercise," Evans said. "For this group of people, if there was a way to mimic exercise, it would make the quality of exercise that they do much more efficient."

The pills are only available experimentally now and Evans is not working with any drug company. But GW1516 has a relatively simple chemical structure and can be synthesized easily, Evans said.

His team created a mass spectrometry test to detect the two drugs and their metabolic by-products in the blood or urine. They are working with the World Anti-Doping Agency to develop the test, perhaps in time to retroactively test 2008 Olympic athletes

Marital woes? Here's help

Tried everything but still unsuccessful in making your marriage work? Well, don’t sweat it. Here’s help... A computerised program called eHarmony Marriage, seeks to help couples communicate better, rekindle romance and resolve conflicts more compassionately. According to The Christian Science Monitor, the US site is an offshoot of the Internet matchmaking service, eHarmony.com .

Les Parrott, creator of the program with his wife, Leslie, a marriage and family therapist says that the ‘online counseling service’ is perfect for people not quite ready for face-to-face counseling, who want to do something practical to improve their relationship, reports Courier Mail .

The counseling session begins with a 40-minute online questionnaire covering everything from finances to housework, trust, family relationships and spirituality. Each partner answers separately. A report is generated outlining their strengths and weaknesses as a couple. For instance - You communicate really well until you get to the in-laws.

From that summary, the computer produces an action plan that includes interactive video exercises, articles and resources. Couples pay 150 dollars for the program, which takes six to eight weeks to complete. Women tend to be the first to seek counseling, Parrott says. Men tend to be more oblivious to the problems.

Rel Comm plunges after earnings disappoint

Shares in Reliance Communications, India’s No. 2 mobile operator, fell as much as 18 percent on Friday morning after its quarterly results disappointed and some brokerages downgraded the stock.Reliance Communications, whose tie-up talks with South Africa’s MTN to create a global top-10 telecoms firm failed last month, reported a 23.8 percent rise in June quarter net profit to 15.12 billion rupees ($357 million), almost in line with a Reuters poll forecast of 15.16 billion.

But analysts said it was boosted by a change in accounting methods, and quarterly revenue of 53.22 billion rupees missed a Reuters poll forecast of 57.61 billion rupees.

Credit Suisse analysts said a change in accounting of foreign exchange-related losses helped net profit by 14.6 billion rupees, adjusting for which it would have been only 499 million rupees.

Citigroup and Morgan Stanley downgraded the stock, while Credit Suisse maintained its "underperform" rating and cut its target price. Citigroup cut its target price to 530 rupees, Morgan Stanley to 509 rupees and Credit Suisse to 425 rupees.

Reliance Communications said tariff cuts and lower revenues from its public phones had put pressure on margins in its wireless business, which generates about ¾ of total revenue.

At 0540 GMT, shares in Reliance Communications were down 12.4 percent at 438 rupees, having fallen as much as 18 percent, in a Mumbai market that was down 1.5 percent.

Bharti Airtel, India’s No. 1 mobile operator, last week reported a forecast-beating 34 percent rise in profit. Its shares were down 2.2 percent at 782 rupees at 0540 GMT

GSM ROLLOUT

The majority of Reliance Communications’ 51 million customers are on the CDMA platform. It is expanding its GSM services to all the 23 of India’s service areas from eight currently, with plans to spend $6 billion in the year to March 2009.

"We believe that the company’s profit growth in the next two quarters will be relatively lower than the industry’s as RCOM gears up for its nationwide GSM launch," Morgan Stanley said in a report.

Still, Morgan Stanley, which has an "equal-weight" rating on the stock, did not advise selling the stock, as it expected annual operating profit growth of 30 percent in 3 years and a planned listing of the telecom’s tower unit would unlock value for investors.

Chairman Anil Ambani told analysts on Thursday that Reliance Communications had approval to take its tower unit public, but was waiting for the capital markets to stabilise.

Citigroup said there was no trigger for the stock in the near term, with a re-rating based on the shift toward GSM some time away.

Reliance Communications has said it would start rolling out the new GSM networks by the end of 2008, and expects the project to be completed in the middle of next year.

Real men cry, want true love: Survey

They’re stereotyped as immature, insensitive and sex-obsessed, but deep down inside, a majority of men pine for true love, aren’t scared of commitment, and say real men can cry, a new survey has shown.

The ‘Great Male Survey’ by a website shatters the myth some women have of the knuckle dragging opposite sex, said James Bassil, the website’s editor-in-chief. The poll of 70,000 men with an average age of 28 debunked many of the standard stereotypes to show that the modern man is driven by a sense of values, loyalty and family.

The survey found that 77 per cent of respondents look for girlfriends with ‘wife potential’ while 75 per cent believe they have a soul mate and 69 per cent would never cheat on their partner. “These survey results will be surprising to many women, most of whom have a completely different perspective of what the average man thinks and feels,” a New York daily quoted Bassil, as saying. “The idea that young guys only want to be single and jump from girlfriend to girlfriend is not true at all,” he added.

The online survey, conducted over a five-week period, found that six out of 10 men were fed up with inaccurate commercial descriptions of them. Bassil said the images of men on television and in advertisements had not changed or been challenged for decades whereas the image of women in the media was always changing as their roles in the home and the workplace altered.

“In TV sitcoms and in adverts, young men are portrayed as immature boys who are always trying to get around their wives or girlfriends finding out about their bad behavior. This is just not the case,” he said. The survey found that 56 per cent of men believed that being a good father or husband made them “manly”. It also found that 75 per cent admitted to crying over a woman while 57 per cent of men cook at home and enjoy doing it.

Are you a real man?

So, you thought real men just look good and swagger around? No, the survey reveals...
77 per cent of men look for girls who are potential wives
75 per cent believe in soul mates
75 per cent admitted to crying over a woman
69 per cent said they would never cheat on their partner
57 per cent enjoy cooking at home
56 per cent of men believed that being a good father or husband made them ‘manly’

Can't conceive? Stop arguing with hubby!

Struggling to conceive? Don’t just opt for IVF. Instead drink less, avoid stressful working hours and simply stop arguing with your husband to boost your chances of having a baby, according to a fertlity expert.

"It is not so much that they (the women) are suffering from an inability to conceive, but an impatience to do so, set against a bleak backdrop in which almost everything else about their lifestyle has a negative impact.

"A lot of people drink as a way to relax, but studies have shown that alcohol directly impacts fertility. In women, it’s thought to affect reproductive hormones, leading to an abnormal menstrual cycle," British fertility expert Zita West told the ’Daily Mail’. West and her colleagues have based their findings on an analysis of several patients who visited their clinic for
fertility treatment.

In fact, according to her, stress also acts as a barrier to reproduction - it can not only kill sex life of a couple but also affects a woman’s fertility. "Women today work incredibly hard -they get up, they have breakfast on the run, they check their Blackberrys last thing at night and they fall into bed at the end of the day exhausted.

"The human body, remarkable as it is, is extremely complex and sensitive to factors such as stress and anxiety, especially when it comes to reproduction. And if you are having sex just once a week or once a month, conception is not necessarily going to be straightforward.

"Next thing, the couple are arguing, and bitter feelings and resentment provide another barrier to sex, which in turn affects conception. And all this may happen in a far shorter time frame than the average seven months it takes to conceive," West said.

Guide to the Big O!

Is your sex life more of a snooze than sizzle? Well, don’t fret it, for a group of experts have come up with an ultimate ’’orgasm guide’’, that is, wholesomely dedicated to pleasure of the naughty variety . Tracey Cox, sex author and presenter; Sarah Hedley, editor of Scarlett magazine; Dr Petra Boynton, sex and relationship expert and Katherine Hoyle, owner of ‘Sh! Women’s Erotic Emporium’ share their expert knowledge for achieving the ’’Big O’’

"The biggest misconception is that women can have orgasms through intercourse. But 70 per cent of women don’t, and that’s totally normal. Guys don’t just lie back hoping to have an orgasm - they pick a thrusting style to suit them. Women need to do the same and take control," The Sun quoted Tracey, as saying.

"The trick to achieving orgasm is to put pressure on your clitoris by rotating your pelvis during sex. Good positions for this are with the woman on top or with the man behind - and if you tighten your pelvic muscles, your orgasm will be more intense.

"These positions are also great for hitting the G spot, which is around the urethra tissue - the part you can feel through the vaginal wall. It’s not miles in like we all previously thought. Another good orgasm tip is to give up on trying to climax simultaneously," Tracey added.

She said: "Much better to take it in turns so you’re not distracted by what the other person is doing - that’s why a 69er is always better in fantasy! And stop thinking of sex having a start, middle and end. You could orgasm from an oral sex session or a quickie against the bathroom wall.