5 ms·
The Science magazine article seemed to me scarce on a number of critical details which are made clear in the abstract: http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop
by gajomi 10y ago
The Science magazine article seemed to me scarce on a number of critical details which are made clear in the abstract: http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nature17654.html http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/natu...
Of particular interest is the fact that the study tries to account for the effects of activity, which is obviously widely variable across human societies and individuals (e.g. French professional cyclist versus Khomani San tracker versus Japanese Sumo wrestler). The abstract specifies that they found an elevated basal metabolic rate, which is activity independent. There is the important and interesting issue of variance. A closer look at Figure 1 one might help in this regard (alas, a paywall...).
- xioxox 10y agoI see in Table 1 that their average human female is 6 kg heavier than their average human male. Strange!
- personjerry 10y agoMight this be because of the higher % body fat in women?
- xioxox 10y agoI don't think so - men are heavier than women on average, e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_body_weight https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_body_weight . Is it a mistake in the table or a weird sample?
- johnlbevan2 10y agoThey did select "relatively sedentary humans"; perhaps in that subset, women are heavier than men? - Men tend to do more muscle-increasing sport than women; meaning a sedentary man isn't gaining that muscle weight. - Women tend to do more cardio activities to burn fat; meaning an active women may be losing weight. I suspect you're right about it being a misprint though.
- thatcat 10y ago>men aren't gaining that muscle weight they already have >Women tend to do more cardio activities to burn fat; meaning an active women may be losing weight. The muscle weight is a metabolic load that requires constant caloric intake to support, sedentary women do more cardio to compensate for their otherwise low metabolism. May not be a misprint.
- Grazester 10y agoWomen seem to heavier in my part of the world
- chongli 10y agoHigher body fat is one of the reasons women are lighter than men. Muscle is higher density than fat.
- ArkyBeagle 10y agoEstrogen and fat are entangled.