BLACKSBURG, Va. (Ivanhoe Newswire) -- Just like bears, many people hunker down and stay inside during cold winter months. But unlike bears, humans would suffer serious health issues sleeping through the cold season. What's a hibernating bear's secret to staying healthy and what does it mean for humans?
You need Flash Player 8 or higher to view video content with the ROO Flash Player.
Click here to download and install it.
Eighty-one-year-old Frances Marshall keeps herself active, but like millions of people, she has a bone disease.
"I was told about 2 years ago that I had osteoporosis and that my bones were susceptible to fractures," Marshall told Ivanhoe.
Osteoporosis makes bones fragile and leads to bone loss and is usually caused by lack of physical activity. There is no cure. Now, population ecologists say sleeping bears could hold the key to preventing the disease.
"One unique thing about bears is that when they go into a hibernating mode, they don't experience bone loss that a human would," Mike Vaughan, Ph.D., a population ecologist at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Va., explained.
Some bears hibernate for almost half a year but show no signs of osteoporosis. People who are inactive that long almost always have bone loss. So what's the bear's secret?
"They're continuing bone growth and we don't know how they do that," Dr. Vaughan said.
To learn more about bear's bones, researchers measured their growth hormones. They learned that bone loss does increase during hibernation, but bone production occurs at the same time. The two processes are balanced out so that little to no bone loss occurs.
"If we can determine how the bears maintain this balance, it might be able to be applied to humans who are in bed rest and avoid this osteoporosis problem," Dr. Vaughan said.
Researchers still have a lot to learn about bear bones but are hopeful it will lead to new therapies for osteoporosis. Instead of curling up on the couch, Marshall's quick pace helps keep her disease in check.
"I don't think osteoporosis has slowed me down one little bit," she said.
She's staying one step ahead of osteoporosis.
Researchers also think they can learn more about human cholesterol buildup from bears. Bears store a large amount of fat in the fall to sustain them through hibernation, yet they don't experience cholesterol buildup like humans.
Where did that first down yellow line come from? How about the NASCAR animation that shows which driver is drafting another driver? We go inside the company to find out how they did it.
One in five girls and one in seven boys will become victims of sexual abuse. Records that track convicted sex offenders are outdated and inaccurate. Now a new tool is helping police keep kids safe.
No one knows why millions of bees are disappearing, but we do know bees are essential for us to live. Now a better, more indestructible bee is being born.
Could breathing the air in your hometown be just as bad as smoking two packs of cigarettes a day? Some people say pollution is getting so bad, it could kill you.
150,000 people will have hip replacement this year. Now engineers are using a famous work of art to help them build a longer lasting, better fitting artificial hip.
