Milk compound tough on waistline isolated

Berne, June 6 (IANS) Scientists have identified a natural milk compound that keeps obesity at bay in mice even as they continue to enjoy high-fat diets.

'This is present in what we've all been eating since day one,' says study co-author Johan Auwerx of Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne, Switzerland.

Researchers identified this ingredient, known as nicotinamide riboside, as they were searching for alternative ways to boost the well-known gene SIRT1, which comes with benefits for both metabolism and longevity.

One way to do that is to target SIRT1 directly, as the red wine ingredient resveratrol appears to do, at least at some doses, the journal Cell Metabolism reports.

Auwerx's team suspected there might be a simpler way to go about it, by boosting levels of one of SIRT1's molecular sidekicks, the cofactor NAD+.

This milk ingredient does just that in a rather appealing way. Not only is it a natural product, but it also gets trapped within cells, where it can do its magic, according to an Ecole Polytechnique statement.

Mice that take nicotinamide riboside in fairly high doses along with their high-fat meals burn more fat and are protected from obesity. They also become better runners thanks to muscles that have greater endurance.

The benefits they observe in mice wouldn't be easy to get from drinking milk alone, Auwerx says. It may be more likely that the compound would serve as a new kind of metabolism-boosting supplement. Tests done in people are now needed to help sort out those details.

On the other hand, he says, this milk substance ultimately offers the same benefits attributed to resveratrol, but in a different way. It's possible that many small effects of ingredients found in our diets could add up to slimmer waistlines - perhaps longer lives, too.