Health

MIT and Harvard scientists are working on exercise that comes in pill form, believe it or not

“People should not say, ‘Oh, great, they’re making a pill; I can stop exercising now.’ The message is exactly the opposite.”

Years from now, research out of MIT and Harvard Medical School could lead to a pill that would mimic the effects of exercise.

By Abby Patkin

October 12, 2022

2 minutes to read

From running to rowing (and even goat yoga), exercise comes in many shapes and sizes. Now, a group of Boston-area scientists say they’re one step closer to delivering the benefits of exercise in pill form.

In a study published last week, researchers at MIT and Harvard Medical School identified how both exercise and high-fat diets modify cells, genes, and cellular pathways. Their research could eventually help develop drugs that would mimic the effects of exercise and combat obesity.

“I think the message to all of the readers should be that exercise is not just about calories burned,” said Dr. Manolis Kellis, one of the senior authors on the study. “Exercise is very much about reprogramming your body to better process energy, to be in a more metabolically active state.”

What the research found

The researchers learned how exercise and high-fat diets have opposite effects on a cellular level, explained Kellis, a professor of computer science in MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory and a member of the Broad Institute.

“What we’re finding is … that both obesity and exercise have dramatic effects on biology,” he said in an interview with Boston.com. “They’re affecting many, many pathways and many genes, in multiple cell types in every one of these tissues.”

Those findings are important, because “high-fat diet and obesity are major risk factors for almost every aspect of human biology, every aspect of human health,” Kellis said, citing COVID-19, diabetes, and neurodegenerative conditions as examples.

In 19 states and two U.S. territories, at least 35% of residents have adult obesity, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Now, researchers have a roadmap to begin developing treatments for people who have trouble exercising or sticking to a healthy diet, whether due to disabilities, socioeconomic status, or other reasons. The research may also benefit people who are exercising and eating healthily but not losing weight, Kellis said.

Next steps

Having first focused on metabolic tissues, the scientists will now look at other parts of the body, including the heart, liver, small intestine, and brain, according to Kellis.

“And I’m particularly excited about the brain, because that’s a place where this positive feedback loop (from exercise) can be dramatically exacerbated,” he said. Their next steps also include studying human volunteers and learning how variable genetics come into play.

While drugs and therapeutics are the researchers’ long-term goal, Kellis emphasized that one of the study’s biggest takeaways is how much of a systemic impact diet and exercise have on the body.

“People should not say, ‘Oh, great, they’re making a pill; I can stop exercising now.’ The message is exactly the opposite,” he said. “Basically, exercise now so you can reprogram your cells for later.”