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+--- Thread: Research The precancerous dark side to fasting (/thread-16394.html)
The precancerous dark side to fasting - C C - Aug 22, 2024
The surprising cause of fasting’s regenerative powers
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-024-02700-2
INTRO: Breaking a fast carries more health benefits than the fasting itself, a study in mice shows. After mice had abstained from food, stem cells surged to repair damage in their intestines — but only when the mice were tucking into their chow again, the study found.
But this activation of stem cells came at a price: mice were more likely to develop precancerous polyps in their intestines if they incurred a cancer-causing genetic change during the post-fasting period than if they hadn’t fasted at all.
These results, published in Nature on 21 August, show that “regeneration isn’t cost-free”, says Emmanuelle Passegué, a stem-cell biologist at Columbia University Irving Medical Center in New York City, who wasn’t involved in the study. “There is a dark side that is important to consider.” (MORE - details)