Just 10 minutes of daily exercise could unlock deeper sleep

 What if getting better sleep depends not just on how much you exercise, but how often you move? Research from The University of Texas at Austin suggests that being physically active every day, even for short periods, may help people spend more time in the deep, restorative stages of sleep that support recovery, mood, and mental health.

The findings suggest that consistency could be an important but often overlooked part of the relationship between exercise and sleep. Rather than saving all their workouts for the weekend, people may benefit from making movement a regular part of their daily routines.

The study, published in the Journal of Physical Activity & Health, examined activity and sleep data collected from University of Texas students who wore Fitbit devices over several months. While previous studies have largely examined how much time people spend exercising, the researchers focused on a different question: Does the number of days someone exercises influence how well they sleep?

"We wanted to know whether it matters if someone spreads out their exercise over the week versus doing it all at once, like a 'weekend warrior,'" said Benjamin Baird, a research assistant professor of psychology in UT Austin's College of Liberal Arts. "And for sleep health, frequency does seem to matter."

Just 10 Minutes of Daily Exercise May Improve Deep Sleep

The researchers found that participants who exercised more frequently tended to experience more restorative sleep. The findings build on previous research connecting physical activity with non-REM sleep, a stage that includes the deep sleep essential for physical recovery and healthy brain function.

Chris Corral, who recently earned a master's degree in health behavior and health education from UT Austin and co-led the study, explained that deep sleep is especially important during the early hours of the night. During this period, the body carries out many of the processes that help it recover from the day's physical and mental demands.

Participants who were active more often spent more time in these valuable stages of sleep.

"That's exactly what you want," Baird said.

"Better sleep means better brain health and potentially lower risks of chronic disease and depression."

Chris Corral

One particularly encouraging finding was how little exercise appeared to be necessary. Among the young adults studied, as little as 10 minutes of moderate to vigorous physical activity per day was associated with better sleep.

Source: ScienceDaily

Scientists make stunning discovery that could help explain why life exists

 Imagine a universe where stars still shine, planets still form, and water exists, but liquids are so thick that living cells can barely function. Even with the chemical ingredients for life, the conditions might make living organisms impossible.

Scientists have uncovered a remarkable connection between the fundamental laws of physics and the ability of life to exist. Their findings suggest that even relatively small changes to some of the universe's most basic physical constants could dramatically alter how liquids flow, potentially preventing essential biological processes from taking place.

The discovery, detailed in a study published in Science Advances, came from physicist Kostya Trachenko at Queen Mary University of London. His theoretical analysis identified an additional constraint on the values of fundamental physical constants: They must permit liquids to move in ways that support life within and between cells.

The work raises a profound question about the universe. Why do the fundamental laws of nature have values that appear so well suited to the existence of life?

The Fundamental Constants That Shape Our Universe

Fundamental physical constants are numbers that govern how the universe operates. Examples include the mass and electric charge of an electron and the Planck constant, which plays a central role in quantum mechanics, the branch of physics that describes matter and energy at extremely small scales.

These quantities are generally considered universal and unchanging over time. Their values influence everything from the behavior of atoms and chemical bonds to the nuclear reactions that power stars and produce elements essential for life.

Despite their importance, scientists still do not know why these constants have the particular values we observe.

An important clue emerged in 2020, when Trachenko and his colleagues demonstrated that fundamental physical constants place a lower limit on the viscosity of liquids.

Viscosity describes how strongly a fluid resists flowing. Water has relatively low viscosity and pours easily, while honey and tar are much more viscous and move slowly. The researchers showed that there is a fundamental limit to how freely a fluid can flow, with that limit ultimately connected to the basic constants of nature.

The 2023 study took this connection much further by examining its implications for biology.

Why Tiny Changes to Physics Could Make Life Impossible

Every living cell depends on the movement of molecules. Nutrients must reach the places where they are needed, waste products must be transported away, and countless chemical reactions must occur in a liquid environment.

Another important process is diffusion, the natural spreading of particles through a fluid. Diffusion helps molecules move around cells and enables many of the chemical interactions required for life.

If the viscosity of those fluids changed too much, these processes could become severely disrupted. Liquids that were too thick might prevent vital materials from moving efficiently, while excessively low viscosity could also interfere with the controlled flow necessary for biological functions.

Trachenko explained the surprising connection:

"Understanding how water flows in a cup turns out to be closely related to the grand challenge to figure out fundamental constants. Life processes in and between living cells require motion and it is viscosity that sets the properties of this motion. If fundamental constants change, viscosity would change too impacting life as we know it. For example, if water was as viscous as tar life would not exist in its current form or not exist at all. This applies beyond water, so all life forms using the liquid state to function would be affected."

The implications extend beyond water. Although all known life depends on water, hypothetical organisms elsewhere in the universe might rely on different liquids. The same fundamental physical constraints would still influence how those liquids behave.

Trachenko suggested that the range of constants compatible with cellular life could be surprisingly narrow.

"Any change in fundamental constants including an increase or decrease would be equally bad news for flow and for liquid-based life. We expect the window to be quite narrow: for example, viscosity of our blood would become too thick or too thin for body functioning with only a few per cent change of some fundamental constants such as the Planck constant or electron charge."

These predictions come from theoretical models rather than experiments in which scientists actually changed fundamental constants. The precise limits that different forms of life could tolerate remain uncertain.

Source: ScienceDaily

Scientists discover why a 100-year-old mushroom disease won't go away

 A disease that has troubled white button mushroom growers for more than 100 years is far more complicated than scientists previously believed. Researchers at the University of Florida have discovered that the problem involves a surprisingly diverse collection of harmful bacteria, rather than a single pathogen. The finding could help explain why the disease has been so difficult to control and lead to more effective ways to protect mushroom crops.

The discovery comes from a University of Florida study investigating bacterial blotch, a persistent disease that damages white button mushrooms and causes significant financial losses for growers.

White button mushrooms are a valuable specialty crop and a familiar ingredient in everything from salads and appetizers to everyday meals. Rich in nutrients and valued for their versatility, they are often promoted as an example of the "food is medicine" concept, which emphasizes the role of nutritious foods in supporting good health. Their nutritional benefits make them an important part of many healthy diets.

Despite their popularity, these mushrooms face a longstanding problem that can make entire portions of a harvest difficult or impossible to sell.

A Century-Old Mushroom Disease With Hidden Culprits

Bacterial blotch causes brown or yellow discoloration on mushroom surfaces, damaging their appearance and reducing their commercial value. The disease can also lower crop yields and shorten shelf life, making it a costly challenge for mushroom farms across the United States.

Adding to the difficulty, visible symptoms sometimes develop only after mushrooms have been shipped to grocery stores or purchased by consumers. This delayed appearance makes the disease especially troublesome for growers trying to ensure consistent product quality.

For many years, scientists primarily associated bacterial blotch with a single disease-causing bacterial pathogen. However, researchers at the University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (UF/IFAS) have now found that the disease involves a much more complex collection of pathogenic bacteria.

These microorganisms can thrive in the carefully controlled, humid indoor environments used for commercial mushroom cultivation. Because several bacterial species may contribute to the same disease, methods designed to target a single pathogen may not be sufficient.

"For years, the industry has struggled with treatments that provide inconsistent results against bacterial blotch," said Samuel Martins, co-author and assistant professor in the UF/IFAS Department of Plant Pathology. "As part of a separate $7 million U.S. Department of Agriculture grant involving Penn State, University of Delaware and UF/IFAS, we are developing advanced diagnostics and sustainable solutions to strengthen mushroom farms nationwide."

DNA Analysis Reveals More Than 17 Bacterial Species

To investigate what was causing the disease, the research team collected affected mushrooms from several production facilities across the southern United States.

The scientists combined DNA sequencing, chemical profiling and conventional laboratory testing to identify the bacteria associated with the damaged mushrooms. DNA sequencing allowed them to examine the genetic identities of microorganisms present in the samples, while the additional tests helped characterize the bacteria and their disease-causing potential.

The results revealed a far more diverse group of pathogens than expected.

"We found more than 17 different species of pathogenic bacteria associated with the disease," said Sameerika Mudiyanselage, the study's lead author and a doctoral student of Martins and Romina Gazis at UF/IFAS Tropical Research and Education Center. "While two well-known bacterial pathogens dominated the known disease profile, we also detected a surprisingly high level of another group of bacteria that has not previously been linked to the mushroom disease."

The discovery suggests that scientists have been overlooking important contributors to bacterial blotch. Although two established pathogens remained prominent, the presence of additional bacterial groups indicates that the disease cannot be fully understood by studying those organisms alone.

This complexity may help explain why bacterial blotch has persisted for generations despite efforts to manage it. When several different microorganisms are associated with a disease, identifying the responsible bacteria, predicting outbreaks, and developing consistently effective treatments become more challenging.

The findings also suggest that growers may need more comprehensive detection methods capable of identifying a broader range of bacterial threats.

"We hope that expanding our research will lead to the development of better diagnostics and more effective treatments to address the full group of disease-causing bacteria in white button mushrooms," she said.

Source: ScienceDaily

Scientists find a surprising clue to why the universe’s expansion doesn’t add up

 It’s well established that the universe is expanding, but there’s serious disagreement among scientists over how fast it’s happening.

Two of our best ways of measuring the cosmic expansion rate, the Hubble constant, give answers that are stubbornly at odds. This presents a major problem in modern cosmology known as the Hubble tension.

However, we wondered if an idea originally proposed to solve another cosmic mystery — the origin of cosmic magnetic fields — could help us unlock the mystery of the Hubble tension.

Our recently published research explores whether extremely weak magnetic fields left over from the earliest moments after the Big Bang might help us unpack the Hubble tension, while offering a glimpse into physics at energies far beyond anything achievable on Earth.

The Hubble constant and tension

Astronomers use the Hubble constant as a measure of how fast the universe is expanding. It is named after the American astronomer Edwin Hubble who first discovered that the universe is expanding.

There are two conceptually different approaches to measuring the Hubble constant. One is indirect, based on predictions of our cosmological model tuned to match the patterns in the cosmic microwave background, the faint afterglow of the Big Bang.

Telescopes such as the Planck Space Telescope have measured tiny fluctuations in this ancient light, predicting a Hubble constant of about 67 kilometers per second per megaparsec (km/s/Mpc). A parsec is a unit of distance used in astronomy equal to about 3.26 light years, or 30.9 trillion kilometers. A megaparsec is one million parsecs.

The second method is more direct, similar to the one used by Hubble in the 1920s when he first demonstrated that the universe is expanding.

It measures how fast distant galaxies are moving away from our home galaxy, the Milky Way, by observing the brightness of supernovae explosions in these far away galaxies.

Type Ia supernovae are known to be “standard candles” because we know that their luminosity is the same wherever they are. That means we can judge the distance to them from how dim they appear to us.

To determine their intrinsic brightness, astronomers use other standard candles, such as Cepheid stars, in the galaxies nearby. These observations, which use the Hubble and James Webb space telescopes, give a higher value of around 73 km/s/Mpc.

This difference between the two measurements is called the Hubble tension. The difference between 67 and 73 may seem small, but it is statistically highly significant. If both methods are correct, then our standard model of cosmology must be missing something important.

Where did cosmic magnetic fields come from?

Magnetic fields are everywhere in the universe. Planets and stars generate their own fields, but gaps in our understanding emerge when we attempt to explain the much larger scale magnetic fields threading galaxies and clusters, and possibly even cosmic voids.

One long-studied possibility is that magnetism first arose in the very early universe, long before the first stars or galaxies formed. These so-called primordial magnetic fields have been studied for decades, and searching for their imprints in the cosmic microwave background and other data offers a way to probe the early universe and the extreme energies that would have generated these fields.

In 2011, two of us (Karsten and Tom) pointed out that primordial magnetic fields would influence recombination — when electrons and protons first combined to form neutral hydrogen — and the universe turned from opaque to transparent. The first light able to travel freely from that moment on is what we now observe as the cosmic microwave background.

If present, primordial magnetic fields would speed up recombination by pushing and pulling on charged particles, making matter slightly clumpy. Where particles are more crowded, they are more likely to meet and form hydrogen.

Shifting the moment when the universe becomes transparent changes the size of the observed patterns in the cosmic microwave background. This effectively alters the cosmic ruler used to measure distances and, in turn, the value of the Hubble constant inferred from the model, helping to ease the Hubble tension. Two of us (Karsten and Levon) demonstrated this effect in 2020 using a simplified model of recombination.

A breakthrough: What we found

In our new paper, we used the first full three-dimensional simulations of the primordial plasma with magnetic fields embedded in it, tracking how hydrogen forms.

We used the hydrogen formation history found through these simulations to compute predictions for how cosmic microwave background should appear if there were primordial magnetic fields, and tested these predictions against observations of the background.

The cosmic microwave background is extraordinarily sensitive to changes in recombination. If primordial magnetic fields altered it in a way that disagreed with observations, the idea could be ruled out. Instead, the data showed that our proposal remains viable.

Across multiple combinations of datasets, we find a consistent, mild preference for primordial magnetic fields, ranging from about 1.5 to three standard deviations. This is not yet a discovery, but a meaningful hint that they exist.

Equally important, the field strengths favored by the data, about five to 10 pico-Gauss today, are close to what would be needed for galaxy and cluster magnetic fields to originate from primordial seeds alone. A pico-Gauss is a unit used to measure the strength of magnetic fields.

Aside from helping ease the Hubble tension, if primordial magnetic fields are confirmed, they would open a new window into how the universe was when it was only split seconds old, perhaps offering a glimpse into important events such as the Big Bang itself.

Our results show that the proposal survives the most detailed test available today and provides clear targets for future observations. Over the next several years, we will learn whether tiny magnetic fields from the dawn of time helped shape the universe we see today and whether they hold the key to resolving the Hubble tension.

Source: ScienceDaily

A forgotten 30-year forest experiment just delivered a huge surprise

 What’s the best way to manage a forest? Australians have argued about this for decades. The debate is often framed as binary: do we protect forests entirely, or harvest trees to support local economies and communities?

The reality is more interesting, as our new research on a long-forgotten experiment in Victoria’s mountain ash forests reveals.

Since the 1970s, scientists and the public have questioned the use of clearfell logging – where all trees in a block of forest are cut down. Conservationists argued it destroys habitat for rare species and reduces the forests’ ecological value. Foresters said mountain ash is adapted to catastrophic bushfires, and clearfelling is the forestry equivalent.

The argument was heated and the polarization unhelpful. But the underlying questions about the impacts of clearfelling, and how they compared to less intensive forestry options, remained unresolved.

A landmark experiment

In the mid-1980s, the Victorian government launched a major restructure of the timber industry, and invested today’s equivalent of A$26 million to explore alternatives to clearfelling. This would use silviculture, the branch of forestry that deals with establishing, growing and tending forests.

The Silvicultural Systems Project was established at two sites between 1987 and 1989: Tanjil Bren in Victoria’s Central Highlands, and Cabbage Tree Creek in East Gippsland.

It was a landmark experiment, comparing forest regeneration across the full range of silvicultural approaches. These included traditional clearfells (250–350 meters wide), small patch clearfells (50–140 meters wide), and heavy thinnings, where 50–70% of trees were cut. Extensive areas of unharvested forest were kept as benchmarks for comparison.

The forest at Tanjil Bren was dense mountain ash regrowth from the 1939 fires. Hundreds of survey plots were established and thousands of seedlings were monitored. By the early 2000s, the results were clear: mountain ash regenerated best on clearfell sites. Where tall canopy trees were retained or the cleared patches were small, common understory species such as acacia dominated.

The findings were published. The access road grew over. The project sign collapsed. The experiment was forgotten. The debates continued.

But the trees kept growing.

Astounding results

In 2014 we visited the Tanjil Bren site as part of a University of Melbourne subject on silviculture in native forests. A colleague, Simon Murphy, had been involved in its establishment and suggested our students see the long-term outcomes of different silvicultural systems side-by-side. What we found was astounding.

The original results still held: 30 years later, the mountain ash in the large cleared patches and clearfelled areas was vigorous and abundant. But it was the heavily thinned parts of the forest that really caught our attention.

The trees left behind after thinning were enormous. While they were only 80 years old, the largest averaged well over a meter in diameter at chest height, and some were more than 1.5m. Thinning had given these trees more space and resources to grow, and they had responded dramatically. The largest trees in the thinned stands were 20% bigger in diameter than those in the unharvested control areas.

More remarkable still: the thinned stands of trees had stored as much or more carbon in their wood than the unharvested control areas. In just 30 years, the heavily thinned forest had not only recovered all the carbon removed during harvesting, but had also gained enough additional carbon to equal the increase seen in the unharvested controls.

These findings have profound implications. Bigger trees are more resistant to fires, so when the next fire occurs, they are more likely to survive. Bigger trees are also more likely to form hollows – a critical and declining habitat for rare species such as the greater glider and Leadbeater’s possum.

The acacia trees that grew in most of the silvicultural treatments are also vital for Leadbeater’s possums, which use it to forage and move around the forest. Camera traps across the sites confirmed this: Leadbeater’s possums were found in every silvicultural treatment plot we surveyed – but none of the unharvested areas.

Lessons for the future

The Tanjil Bren SSP offers three important lessons.

First, long-term silvicultural experiments are irreplaceable. Australia’s forests contain many forgotten experiments that could transform our understanding of how forests respond to human intervention. But all too often, they end up neglected, unfunded and forgotten. We should find them before it is too late.

Second, forest thinning is not a trade-off. Our findings show this for mountain ash, and other studies in North America have shown this for conifer forests. It can deliver wood for local industry, absorb carbon and improve habitat for wildlife. It is a win-win-win outcome that challenges the false dichotomy of conservation versus production that has dominated public debate for decades.

While thinning cannot (and should not) be done everywhere, it may be a useful tool to create more variety in tree ages and sizes, particularly in forests impacted by clearfelling or high-severity fire.

Third, and perhaps most importantly: there is no silvicultural silver bullet for managing forests. The long-forgotten experiment at Tanjil Bren has taught us that there are options available for managing our forests beyond clearfelling that can contribute to the societal demand for wood, maintain carbon stocks, and conserve biodiversity.

Source: ScienceDaily

A meteor hit Oklahoma 100 million years later than scientists thought

 Researchers at The University of Texas at Austin have revised a key piece of Oklahoma's geologic history, with possible implications for how scientists interpret major events in the history of life on Earth.

Beneath the town of Ames, Oklahoma, lies a meteor impact structure that stretches for miles underground. Layers of sediment now cover the crater, but it remains significant both scientifically and economically. The Ames impact structure is also a major producer of oil and gas.

A Crater Long Linked to an Ancient Meteor Event

For years, the Ames crater was thought to belong to a cluster of major meteor impacts across North America dating to roughly 467.5 million years ago. That period is known as the Ordovician Meteor Event.

Because so many impact structures appear to date from around the same time, some researchers have proposed that Earth may once have been surrounded by a Saturn-like ring of asteroid debris during the Middle Ordovician.

New work from UT researchers now shows that the Ames impact does not belong to that episode.

By dating zircon crystals taken from granite altered by the impact, the team determined that the meteorite struck about 370 million years ago during the Late Devonian. That makes the crater nearly 100 million years younger than previously believed.

"No matter what technique we used, it was coming back to this younger signal," said lead author Elizabeth Catlos, associate professor at UT's Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences.

The research was published in July in Meteoritics & Planetary Science.

Why the Earlier Date Was Misleading

Before this study, the Ames impact had only been dated using biological evidence. Researchers had found teeth from an ancient eel-like animal called a conodont preserved in the rock. Those fossils came from organisms that lived during the older Ordovician period.

But Catlos said the teeth were probably already millions of years old by the time the asteroid struck. The impact likely churned up older material and mixed the fossils into the rocks while still preserving them.

The zircon dating provides a very different timeline. It shows that the Ames crater could not have formed during the Ordovician Meteor Event.

Instead, its new age places it close to the Frasnian-Famennian mass extinction event, which occurred about 372 million years ago and wiped out a large proportion of marine life on Earth.

Tiny Zircon Crystals Preserve the Impact

Danny Stockli, dean of the Jackson School of Geosciences and a co-author of the study, said zircon U-Pb dating offers one of the most accurate ways to determine when events occurred deep in Earth's past.

Zircon crystals can also preserve microscopic structures created by the intense pressures generated during an impact.

"These small crystals allow us to go back in time and learn about the major changes to Earth's ancient landscapes," Stockli said. "It would be great to do this for more of the meteor impact sites across the continent so we could get a more accurate timeline for these major events."

To confirm that the zircons had actually been affected by the meteor strike, the team worked with NASA to image the crystals using cathodoluminescence and electron backscatter diffraction.

When zircon experiences the extreme conditions of an impact, it recrystallizes in a distinctive way. Those changes can be detected with these imaging techniques, allowing researchers to verify that the crystals recorded the collision itself.

A New Piece of a Mass Extinction Puzzle

According to Catlos, establishing more precise dates for mass extinctions and other major events is essential for understanding how Earth has changed over time.

One key question is whether extinction events were triggered primarily by forces from space, such as meteor impacts, or by processes within Earth, including episodes of massive volcanic activity.

"With this research, we're basically taking a major pawn out of the Ordovician Meteor Event and dumping it into the Frasnian-Famennian event, and saying, 'This is where this impact belongs,'" she said.

The project was initiated by former Jackson School of Geosciences graduate student Andrew Parisi, who graduated in 2018 and has since passed away. Parisi traveled to Oklahoma to obtain the Ames rock core from the Oklahoma Geological Survey, extracted zircon crystals from the material, and helped determine their ages.

Co-author Michael Brookfield, an affiliated researcher at the school, also passed away before the paper was published.

Research Professor Sean Gulick and Professor Emeritus Mark Cloos at the Jackson School also contributed to the research.

Source: ScienceDaily

Easing constipation: A 20-minute walk can get your gut moving almost immediately

 Constipation is one of the most common digestive problems, affecting people across age groups and backgrounds. Beyond causing bloating, straining, and infrequent bowel movements, it can also interfere with daily life by increasing stress, reducing productivity, and lowering overall quality of life. When constipation becomes persistent, it may also contribute to complications such as hemorrhoids, cardiovascular strain, and an increased risk of colorectal problems.

Despite how widespread it is, constipation is often ignored or left untreated until symptoms become difficult to manage. That makes it important to better understand both what causes sluggish bowel function and which strategies can help restore normal digestion.

Why Walking May Help the Gut

Physical activity is one of the simplest approaches commonly recommended for constipation. People who are more active generally tend to have healthier bowel function, while prolonged inactivity is often associated with slower digestion.

Exactly why movement helps, however, is not fully understood. Much of the previous research has examined the effects of regular exercise over longer periods. Scientists know much less about what happens inside the digestive system immediately after a person starts moving.

Understanding those rapid changes could help explain why even a relatively short walk may help stimulate bowel function.

Researchers from Fujita Health University set out to investigate how quickly physical activity can influence gut motility in healthy adults. In their study, published in Scientific Reports, the team used bowel sounds (BS) as a non-invasive way to monitor intestinal activity.

Bowel sounds are produced as gas and fluid move through the intestines. Because those movements are related to the contractions that propel digestive contents through the gut, the sounds can provide clues about gut motility. By recording them before and after exercise, the researchers were able to examine how rapidly the digestive system responded to walking.

What Happened After a 20 Minute Walk

The study included 21 healthy young adults. At the beginning of the experiment, each participant lay quietly while the researchers recorded one minute of baseline BS using an electronic stethoscope and advanced signal-processing software.

The participants then walked on a treadmill for 20 minutes at a comfortable, self-selected pace. After the walk, they returned to a lying position while the researchers recorded BS at several points during the following 15 minutes.

Gut motility was evaluated using three measurements. These included the Sound Index (SI), which measures the total amplitude of sound activity; the percentage of recording time during which BS could be detected; and the number of separate BS events occurring each minute.

The response appeared quickly.

Within one to two minutes after participants finished walking, all three measures had risen significantly compared with their resting levels. The amplitude of the bowel sounds nearly doubled, the sounds were present during a much larger share of the recordings, and the number of individual sounds per minute also increased.

The effect did not last long. The increases diminished within two to three minutes. Still, the speed of the response showed that even light activity can produce an immediate and measurable increase in gut motility.

A Possible Explanation for Walking and Constipation Relief

The findings may help clarify why walking is so often recommended for people dealing with constipation.

Professor Yohei Otaka, senior author of the study, shares, "Walking can serve as an effective, immediate tool for stimulating bowel function. The findings also point to potential underlying mechanisms, such as changes in autonomic nervous system activity or reflexes triggered by the body's natural oscillations during movement."

The autonomic nervous system helps regulate many automatic functions in the body, including digestion. The physical motion created while walking could also contribute by triggering reflexes that encourage the intestines to become more active.

The research team also included Professor Shigeo Tanabe (Graduate School of Health Sciences, Fujita Health University) and Kento Katagiri (Department of Rehabilitation Medicine, School of Medicine, Fujita Health University), who contributed to study design, analysis, and manuscript preparation.

Bowel Sounds Could Offer a New Research Tool

Beyond the effects of walking itself, the findings suggest that BS analysis could become a useful non-invasive method for studying gastrointestinal function and constipation.

Because bowel sounds can be monitored without more invasive procedures, researchers may be able to use the technique to track short term changes in intestinal movement and better understand how different behaviors or treatments affect the digestive system.

Source: ScienceDaily