Is keto diet putting you at diabetes risk?

According to a study, ketogenic diets — high-fat, adequate-protein, low-carbohydrate diet — may lead to an increased risk of type 2 diabetes. The study conducted by ETH Zurich in conjunction with University Children’s Hospital Zurich involved feeding mice two different types of diet and then performing standard metabolic tests on them. Using specialised procedures, the researchers were able to determine the effects of internal sugar production from the animal (mostly the liver), and sugar uptake into tissues (mostly the muscle), during insulin action. Christian Wolfrum, one of the corresponding authors on the paper, said, “Diabetes is one of the biggest health issues we face. Although ketogenic diets are known to be healthy, our findings indicate that there may be an increased risk of insulin resistance with this type of diet that may lead to type 2 diabetes.” The study appears in the Journal of Physiology.

Blue light from smartphones may speed up blindness

The blue light emitted from smartphones and other digital devices can accelerate blindness by transforming vital molecules in the eye’s retina into cell killers, a study has found. Macular degeneration, an incurable eye disease that results in significant vision loss starting on average in a person’s 50s or 60s, is the death of photoreceptor cells in the retina. Those cells need molecules called retinal to sense light and trigger a cascade of signalling to the brain. “We are being exposed to blue light continuously, and the eye’s cornea and lens cannot block or reflect it,” said Ajith Karunarathne, an assistant professor at the University of Toledo in US. “It’s no secret that blue light harms our vision by damaging the eye’s retina. Our experiments explain how this happens, and we hope this leads to therapies that slow macular degeneration, such as a new kind of eye drop,” said Karunarathne. The study found that blue light exposure causes retinal to trigger reactions that generate poisonous chemical molecules in photoreceptor cells.

Too much sleep can up early death risk

While getting enough sleep is vital for staying healthy, snoozing for over nine hours a day could increase the risk of developing heart problems and early death, a study has found. 

Researchers from the American Heart Association recently conducted a study to evaluate the association between sleep duration and cardiovascular disease by reviewing 74 studies, which observed the quality and length of sleep of more than 3.3 million participants.

They found those who slept for 10 hours were 30 per cent more likely to die prematurely, compared to those who slept for eight hours. Longer sleepers were about 50 per cent more likely to develop cardiovascular disease. Those who slept less than seven hours did not have a heightened risk of early mortality or heart disease. “We found a significant association between deviations in sleep duration and both mortality and adverse cardiovascular outcomes,” researchers said.  — Agencies