Physical Training Decreases Total Plasma Homocysteine and Cysteine in Middle-Aged Subjects

Abstract

Aims: The aim of this study was to evaluate whether endurance exercise in middle-aged men induces changes in plasma total homocysteine (tHcy) and total cysteine (tCys), and whether these changes depend on the diet especially on vitamin B₆, folic acid and vitamin B₁₂ intakes. Methods: Twelve trained subjects (52.33 ± 2.4 years) and twelve untrained subjects (56.23 ± 0.9 years) volunteered for the present study. tHcy and tCys were measured with high-pressure liquid chromatography at rest in both groups and during an incremental exercise performed on a cycle ergometer until exhaustion in the trained subjects. Results: At baseline homocysteinemia and cysteinemia were lower in trained subjects (7.48 ± 0.4 and 183.45 ± 13.6 µmol/l) compared with untrained subjects (9.79 ± 0.4 µmol/l, p < 0.001; 229.01 ±14.7 µmol/l, p < 0.05, respectively). Incremental exercise also induced a decrease in tHcy and tCys concentrations. Moreover, tHcy concentration was negatively related to the folic acid and B₁₂ intakes in untrained (r = –0.589, p < 0.05; r = –0.580, p < 0.05, respectively) as well as in trained groups (r = –0.709, p < 0.01; r = –0.731, p < 0.01, respectively) whereas no correlation between tCys and vitamin in the diet was observed. Conclusion: This study demonstrates that the combined effects of a chronic physical exercise and a high folate and vitamin B₁₂ intake could be responsible for the reduction of plasma tHcy and tCys concentrations that might be a key for the prevention of many diseases.

Effects of two different exercise trainings on plasma homocysteine levels and other cardiovascular disease risks

“…Regular exercise decreases resting hearth rate, blood pressure, low density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol level, plasma insulin level, improves physical fitness [1][2][3][4][5] and minimize the risk factors of the cardiovascular diseases (CVD) [1][2][3]. Homocysteine (Hcy) is a sulfur-containing nonproteinforming amino acid and intermediate in the metabolic pathway of the dietary essential amino-acid methionine [6].…”

“…Homocysteine (Hcy) is a sulfur-containing nonproteinforming amino acid and intermediate in the metabolic pathway of the dietary essential amino-acid methionine [6]. Homocysteine is a metabolic product of methionine [5,[7][8][9][10] and its metabolism has two pathways which requires folate+vitamin B 12 and vitamin B 6 [11]. For the last 20 years hyperhomocysteinemia (blood Hcy concentration equal or higher than 16 μmol/L) is a commonly accepted independent risk factor for cardiovascular diseases [5,8,[12][13][14][15][16][17][18].…”

“…Homocysteine is a metabolic product of methionine [5,[7][8][9][10] and its metabolism has two pathways which requires folate+vitamin B 12 and vitamin B 6 [11]. For the last 20 years hyperhomocysteinemia (blood Hcy concentration equal or higher than 16 μmol/L) is a commonly accepted independent risk factor for cardiovascular diseases [5,8,[12][13][14][15][16][17][18]. It's thought that the increase in Hcy levels causes atherosclerosis and thrombosis through several ways [1,10,11,[18][19][20].…”

“…In chronic exercise studies it was determined that Hcy level decreased in patients with high Hcy concentrations [26] or low physical fitness levels [10,27]. There's still equivocal results for effects of sub-maximal aerobic exercise training [5,9,26,28] and limited information about the effect of resistance exercises [10,27] on Hcy levels in sedentary individuals. For the last two decades, the American College of Sports Medicine recognized resistance training as a significant component of a comprehensive fitness program to improve cardiovascular functions in adults [29].…”

Exercise prevents hyperhomocysteinemia in a dietary folate-restricted mouse model

“…owing in large part to the variations in study design and exercise regimes [7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15]. Moreover, 82 discrepancies within these human studies, including B-vitamin and subject training status, as 83 well as variations in mode, intensity, and duration of test exercises, limit the strength of their 84 conclusions [16,17].…”