The "wrong" FTO gene is not a verdict on obesity
An active lifestyle can prevent genetically determined obesityKirill Stasevich, Compulenta
The presence of the "obesity gene" is not always an alternative verdict to the body. It turns out that an active lifestyle and physical activity can reduce the likelihood of developing obesity by a third, even with a "bad" gene in the genome.
The successes of modern genetics have allowed many people suffering from overweight to shift responsibility for this to their own genes. Indeed, with the discovery of the FTO gene, the main culprit of obesity seemed to have been found. A variety of studies have shown that changes in FTO, as a rule, are accompanied by a set of extra pounds. And since we ourselves have no control over the genes yet, it turns out that obesity is not due to an unhealthy diet and a sedentary lifestyle, but because fate so wills.
And yet this is not quite true. The work of scientists from the British Council for Medical Research indicates that physical activity is of great importance in the development of obesity, even if a person has a "bad" FTO gene. An analysis of a colossal amount of data on the FTO problem was undertaken with the involvement of the researchers themselves who have been studying and are engaged in this gene. In total, 218 thousand adults were included in the "statistics", who had a copy of the FTO gene in their genome, contributing to the appearance of excess weight. Ultimately, scientists came to the conclusion that an active lifestyle reduces the risk of obesity by 27% — and this, you will agree, is not so little.
The research results are published on the website PLoS Medicine (Physical Activity Attenuates the Influence of FTO Variants on Obesity Risk: A Meta-Analysis of 218,166 Adults and 19,268 Children).
Although the work is statistical in nature, its results are easy to explain if we recall the reaction rate. This is an old concept from classical genetics, which describes the degree of interaction between the genotype and the environment. The same genotype can be expressed to different degrees, depending on how much the environment allows it. As an abstract example, we can take the color of the eyes. The eyes can be, for example, bright green or a more restrained shade, and how much the color will be expressed depends, for example, on how a person ate in childhood. Well, in the case of eye color, other factors may work, but the reaction rate of the corresponding gene will still be.
Obviously, the obesity gene also has it. Even if you got a bad copy of the FTO, whether it will manifest in full force or not depends on extra-genetic factors, including the environment, diet and lifestyle. So you should not regard the signs of the appearance of excess weight as a genetic finger of fate. As for purely medical conclusions, such studies indicate the need for complex therapy, where recommendations of a general physiological nature will be combined with attention to the patient's personality, his biography, psychology and lifestyle.
Prepared based on the materials of the British Medical Research Council: Physical activity reduces the effect of the 'obesity gene'.
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03.11.2011