Black Bear Superpower: How do These Bears Hibernate for Months and Still Remain Fit and Healthy?

In a recent discovery of experts and researchers alike, something strange in black bear plasma permits them to slumber for seven months an annum whilst keeping strong and robust.

Black Bears' Superpowers

Researchers are not yet certain as to what that something is, however in a very fresh research, results seem to have aided in narrowing down the possibilities, Science Alert covered.

According to official statement and notes from the authors posted under the journal of Scientific Reports, if the living beings or humans managed to sleep for as much as a black bear, the musculature of humans might start to fail due to a dearth of regular exercise however, this is different when it comes to the bears because when a bear comes from its lair at the onset of springtime, its physique is lean and muscular.

Notwithstanding almost no motion, not even to sip, feed, defecate, or urinate, the creature's muscular development and endurance remain mostly preserved from the previous cycle.

Experts have spent so long seeking to understand out how this ability functions for ages, and recent research reveals that ionic compounds in bear plasma are important. They might still aid in the prevention of mass and strength damage in humans.

This could perhaps seem strange initially, however when Japanese scientists put a mixture of plasma from seven hibernating creatures straight to cellular samples consisting of living thing core mass and strength tissues, they detected an increase in the cells' nutritional composition in less than 24 hours, as shown in the findings posted under PLOS ONE.

Simultaneously, there had been a reduction in the synthesis of a transcription factor that is important in the protein loss of inactive fibers. These metabolic alterations have primarily been observed when hibernating plasma was introduced.

Just before serum was extracted from adaptive black bears throughout the warmer months, it did not significantly affect the normal cycle of polypeptide breakdown in human skeletal muscle cells.

Hibernating Black Bears

As per Hiroshima University physiologist Mitsunori Miyazaki, research found that some component in hibernating bear blood might very well influence mitochondrial function in human embryonic skeletal muscle cells and assist to body composition preservation. Even so, discovery of this 'possible cause' is still to be accomplished.

Roughly comparable trials using black bear blood have already been conducted in the previous era, although nothing at all were proven able to determine the particular stumbling block fueling the ability. Blood from hibernating bears reduced proteome synthesis in human skeletal muscle tissue in 2018, as per NCBI.

A comparable impact has been observed in rat skeletal muscle tissue. For the time being, that was all researchers truly understand, and yet Miyazaki is determined to find out far more.

More so, Mitsunori Miyazaki further explains that whilst also discovering this 'component' in hibernating bear serum and explaining the unknown process behind 'muscles which does not deteriorate despite when not used' in hibernating bears, scientists can design efficient rehabilitation procedures in people and avoid being incapacitated in the long term, as per Science Daily report.