Hacker News Reader

Comment by reportgunner | Hacker News Reader

So what's the surprising cause ? I couldn't find it after skimming the article twice.

The surprise is that the benefit isn’t gained until you start eating again. It’s not during the fast that good things happen, apparently.

The article actually seemed to suggest that eating after fasting increased the chance of "precancerous growths", which seems like "bad things".

And then refuted that with a different study at the end. Weird.

> Breaking a fast carries more health benefits than the fasting itself, a study in mice shows1. 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

Literally the first paragraph

I still don't see the cause. Eating is the cause ? How is that surprising ?

You can have a finding without knowing the underlying cause. As an easy example, see gravity.

In this case, the presumption is that it isn't necessarily the eating? It is specifically the sequence of fasting -> eating. As just eating with no fasting involved does not trigger this. Similarly, just fasting did not get this response, but it primed the mice so that their next meal did.

Yeah the title is "The surprising cause of fasting’s regenerative powers", I wanted to know about the cause. The article doesn't mention it.

Clickbait article.

Apologies on missing this. Fair. I was interested in the link and the idea that there is something there, even if we don't know what.

tldr; positively impacts stem cells making them more effective at repairing damage

Which also lead to tumors as polyamines are involved in cellular division.

.. in mice.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com