Indroduction
The Genome
Stored in the DNA of every cell, the genome is the complete set of genetic information in an organism and dictates form, and function… But is that the whole story?
The study of factors which interact with our DNA to effect gene expression.
Pre-Agricultural hunter-gatherers who survived childhood lived long and were
Healthier than we are today..
Studying Our Ancestors environment and Lifestyle is vital if we want to improve modern health standards.
Life expectancy vs Life expectancy at birth.
A common myth surrounding our pre-aggracultural ancestors is that our life expectancy was much shorter when we lived as hunter gatherer’s - this video explains how this misconception comes about.
Environmental factors that effect gene expression can include Mechanical factors, chemical or disease exposure. Here we talk about the mechanome.
Mismatch Theory
The basis of Ancestral Health
Hormesis
Hormesis was described briefly in our introductory module, so lets review it and dive in a bit further:
Challenge any system in our body (from our brain to our immune system) too little and it becomes fragile. Challenge it too much or too quickly and you can potentially cause injury.
We gave the example of the skeletal system: If we don’t do enough weight bearing exercise, then our bones become osteopenic and brittle. If we apply to much weight to bone too quickly, it will break. But if we regularly apply a moderate load to our bones they adapt and become stronger.
Then we experienced first hand how hormesis can work for other systems in our body when we did the interactive challenge of heat exposure, by slowly exposing our cardiovascular system to heat, we developed resilience to heat and as a result had bigger comfort bubble for temperature. Hormesis also applies to cognition - it all comes back to a very well known saying - use it or loose it! In one of the upcoming lessons we will explore hormesis at work on our tissues at a cellular level. (lesson Number: _ casting at a cellular level).
The role of Hormesis in the Evolutionary mismatch theory
The basis of Ancestral Health
Evolutionary mismatch And the Hormesis spectrum
The basis of Ancestral Health
In the Next lesson we look at the effects of de-conditioning for modern humans
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