How Your Bones Change With Exercise
Summary
TLDRThis educational video delves into the remarkable adaptability of human bones in response to exercise. It illustrates how bones, composed of compact and spongy tissues, dynamically adjust their density and structure under stress. The video emphasizes the importance of both compressive and tensile forces in bone health, advocating for a mix of weight-bearing and resistance exercises. It also introduces key bone cells like osteoblasts and osteoclasts, hinting at the role of estrogen in bone density, which is a topic for future exploration.
Takeaways
- 🏃 Exercise is crucial for bone health, as it stimulates bone tissue to adapt and increase in density.
- 🚀 Astronauts in zero gravity environments experience a decrease in bone density, demonstrating the importance of gravity and movement for bone maintenance.
- 🦴 Bones are composed of compact and spongy (trabecular) bone tissue, with the latter aligning to support the stress placed on bones.
- 🔬 Bone tissue contains both organic (collagen) and inorganic (hydroxyapatite) substances, which provide tensile and compressive strength respectively.
- 💪 Resistance training and weight-bearing exercises are effective for bone health as they apply both compressive and tensile forces on bones.
- 🏋️♂️ Consistency in exercise is key for long-term bone health adaptations, as bones constantly remodel in response to stress.
- 🚴♂️ Non-impact exercises like cycling can also contribute to bone health, indicating that high-impact activities are not the only way to stimulate bone density.
- 🏃♀️ Running and other weight-bearing activities are beneficial for bone health, especially in the lower limbs.
- 🤸♂️ A combination of endurance and strength training is recommended for optimal bone health.
- 🧬 Bone cells like osteoblasts and osteoclasts play a critical role in bone remodeling, with exercise influencing their activity balance.
Q & A
How does exercise affect bone density?
-Exercise is crucial for bone health as it causes the bone tissue to adapt by increasing its density, changing its shape, and modifying its internal architecture in response to the stress placed upon it.
What happened to the bone density of early astronauts when they returned from space?
-Early astronauts experienced a decrease in bone density by as much as 20 percent upon returning from space due to the zero gravity environment, illustrating that bone tissue is constantly adapting to the stress it undergoes.
What are the two types of bone tissue in the human body?
-The two types of bone tissue are compact bone tissue, which is the dense outer portion of bones, and spongy bone tissue, also known as trabecular bone, found internally and resembling a sponge in structure.
What are trabeculae and what is their function in bones?
-Trabeculae are the tiny beams of bone found in spongy bone tissue. They are aligned in the direct lines of stress that bones experience daily, providing strength and support in the direction of applied forces.
How do bones adapt to exercise through their internal composition?
-Bones adapt to exercise by increasing both the organic and inorganic substances within the bone tissue. The organic substance, collagen, provides tensile strength, while the inorganic substance, hydroxyapatite (composed mainly of calcium and phosphate), provides compressive strength.
What types of exercises are beneficial for bone health?
-Exercises that push and pull on the bones, exposing them to both compressive and tensile forces, are beneficial for bone health. This includes activities like walking, running, jumping, resistance training, and weightlifting.
Why is consistency important in exercise for bone health?
-Consistency in exercise is vital for bone health because it ensures continuous stimulation of bone tissue, which is necessary for the long-term adaptations that increase and maintain bone density.
How does the body respond to different intensities of resistance training for bone health?
-For optimal bone health, resistance training should be of at least moderate intensity, where the weight lifted can be managed for six to twelve repetitions. This intensity stimulates bone density increase more effectively.
Can you maintain bone density without high-impact exercises like running?
-Yes, you can maintain bone density without high-impact exercises by engaging in activities that still provide a stimulus to the bones, such as cycling or weight training that targets the lower limbs.
What role do osteoblasts and osteoclasts play in the remodeling of bone tissue?
-Osteoblasts are responsible for building up new bone tissue by laying down collagen and hydroxyapatite, while osteoclasts break down old bone tissue. Their balanced activity maintains bone density, but an imbalance, such as increased osteoclast activity with reduced physical activity, can lead to a decrease in bone density.
What is the significance of estrogen in relation to bone health and osteoclasts?
-Estrogen tends to inhibit osteoclasts, which break down bone tissue. This suggests that changes in estrogen levels, such as during menopause in women, can affect bone density by potentially allowing osteoclast activity to exceed that of osteoblasts.
Outlines
🏃♂️ Exercise and Bone Health
This paragraph introduces the surprising impact of exercise on bone health. Contrary to common belief that exercise primarily affects muscles and cardiovascular health, it also significantly influences bone density and structure. The script uses the example of astronauts experiencing a decrease in bone density due to zero gravity, highlighting the dynamic nature of bone tissue that adapts to stress. The video promises to explore how bones change in response to exercise and the role of various types of physical activity in maintaining and enhancing bone health.
🦴 Anatomy of Bones and Adaptation
The script delves into the anatomy of bones, explaining the difference between compact and spongy (trabecular) bone tissue. It emphasizes the structural intelligence of spongy bone, where the trabeculae align with the stress lines to provide support. The paragraph further discusses how bones adapt to exercise by increasing density and altering shape and internal architecture. The focus is on the importance of exercises that apply both compressive and tensile forces on bones, which are crucial for stimulating bone tissue adaptation. The composition of bone tissue, including organic collagen for tensile strength and inorganic hydroxyapatite for compressive strength, is also covered.
💪 Consistency in Exercise for Bone Health
This paragraph underscores the importance of consistency in exercise for long-term bone health adaptations. It introduces the sponsor, Copilot, a fitness company that emphasizes consistent workouts and quality of life changes. The speaker shares a personal experience with Copilot, highlighting the convenience of customized fitness plans and the benefits of having a real coach for accountability and progress tracking. The paragraph also discusses various exercises that can stimulate bone health, such as walking, running, jumping, resistance training, and how these activities create both compressive and tensile forces on bones. The video concludes with a teaser about the role of estrogen in bone health, hinting at a future discussion on this topic.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Bone Tissue
💡Bone Density
💡Compact Bone
💡Spongy Bone
💡Trabeculae
💡Exercise
💡Compressive and Tensile Forces
💡Hydroxyapatite
💡Collagen
💡Osteoblasts
💡Osteoclasts
Highlights
Bone is dynamic tissue that constantly adapts to stress and physical activity.
Astronauts experienced up to 20% bone density loss due to zero gravity, highlighting the importance of mechanical stress for bone health.
Bone density can be maintained and increased through exercise, as bones adapt by altering their shape and internal architecture.
Bones are made of compact and spongy tissue, with trabeculae (tiny beams) in spongy bone aligning to deal with daily stresses.
Exercise exposes bones to compressive and tensile forces, crucial for strengthening the bone's organic (collagen) and inorganic (hydroxyapatite) components.
Collagen fibers in bone resist tensile forces, while hydroxyapatite provides strength to resist compressive forces.
Consistency in physical activity is key to long-term adaptations in bone tissue, leading to increased strength and density.
Exercises like running and jumping apply compressive forces, while resistance training (e.g., bicep curls) creates tensile forces on bones.
A simple action, such as bending a bone, creates both tensile and compressive forces on different sides of the bone.
Runners generally have good bone density, particularly in their lower limbs, without much weight training.
Weight training stimulates bones with both compressive and tensile forces, which is important for overall bone health.
Osteoblasts build bone tissue, while osteoclasts resorb old bone; exercise helps osteoblasts outpace osteoclasts, increasing bone density.
Lack of exercise, like in space, allows osteoclasts to outpace osteoblasts, leading to bone density loss.
Bone tissue constantly remodels, even without exercise, through the coordinated action of osteoblasts and osteoclasts.
Estrogen inhibits osteoclast activity, playing a role in bone density, particularly during certain stages of a woman’s life.
Transcripts
bone is some of the most amazing living
and dynamic tissue in the human body but
when you exercise and your body adapts
to that exercise bone probably isn't the
first thing that comes to mind often
when we think of exercise we think of it
affecting things like muscle fat and
even things like the heart and
cardiovascular system so in today's
video we're going to talk about just how
important exercise is for your bones and
how that bone tissue will actually
modify and adapt to that exercise it's
ridiculously amazing so let's jump right
into this Pony anatomical awesomeness
foreign
so let's start with an example that will
help illustrate why this is so important
when we first started exploring outer
space the early astronauts would return
home for their physicals only to find
that their bone density had decreased as
much as 20 percent in some cases now
that was obviously quite alarming seeing
as how they were in Prime physical
condition prior to leaving but this
helped us to learn something very
important in regards to Bone tissue bone
is constantly changing and adapting to
the stress placed upon it so if you
spend an extended period of time in a
zero gravity environment that bone is
going to change and adapt by decreasing
its bone density kind of like I use it
or lose it situation but that also means
that exercise and physical activity
plays a huge role in maintaining and
even increasing bone density exercise
doesn't just cause the bone to increase
its density bone will also adapt by
changing its shape and its internal
architecture so let's take a look at
some of these amazing features of Bones
so we can figure out what's actually
happening with with these adaptations
and changes and of course get into how
muscles and the various forms of
exercise play a role in this if we were
to take a look at a bone in the human
body we would see that that bone is made
up of two types of bone tissue compact
bone tissue and spongy bone tissue
compact bone is the dense outer portion
of all bones so everything you're seeing
on the outside of this bone is the
compact bone and that compact bone can
get pretty thick in the shafts of the
long bone especially if you take a look
at where we cut into this tibia or shin
bone here you can see how thick that
compact bone can get but deep to this
compact bone is the spongy bone and just
taking a look at that picture you can
see kind of looks like a sponge but look
how cool the real spongy bone is you can
see all these tiny little beams of bone
and those little beans are called
trabeculae which actually conveniently
translates to little beam but this is
also why spongy bone is known as
trabecular bone as well now these
tropically what's really ridiculously
awesome about them is that at first
glance they may look that their shape
and their orientation is random but that
is not the case the shape the
orientation the architecture of these
trabeculae if you will they are aligned
in the direct lines of stress that your
bones have to deal with on a day-to-day
basis think how amazing that is just
like somebody building a building with
support beams and Scaffolding your bones
do the same thing and Orient these
little beams to deal with the forces
that your bones get to see on a
day-to-day basis so what types of
activities and exercise helps to
increase bone density and maintain this
architecture and really important what
is it that's inside the bone that is
adapting to these activities as far as
activities and exercises we need to do
things that both push and pull on the
bones or in other words expose the bones
to both compressive and tensile forces
now you might be thinking that seems
like a little bit of an
oversimplification I just need to push
and pull on my bones and I'm good well
this is important because of what the
bone tissue is actually made of and how
this stuff's going to adapt there are
two very different substances inside of
bone tissue an organic substance that
gives bone its tensile strength and an
inorganic substance that gives bone its
compressive strength both of these
substances we want the bone to adapt and
increase more of hence this pushing and
pulling so let's talk about what these
two substances are and then how this
would apply to the exercises if we were
to zoom into bone tissue even between
the cells we would see these two
components or substances that make up
the bone tissue the inorganic substance
would be a hard crystal-like substance
called hydroxyapatite now that's kind of
a funny name but this hydroxyapatite is
made up of mostly calcium and phosphate
that's why calcium is so important to
the health of your bones it's used to
make this hydroxyapatite which gives
bone its hard characteristic and its
ability to resist those pushing or
compressive forces the organic component
of bone is actually collagen collagen
will bond and form this intimate
relationship with the hydroxyapatite and
collagen fibers are these string-like
proteins that resist being pulled apart
and so think of it as this microscopic
rope that can bend and be flexible but
resist that tensile force or being
pulled apart and therefore gives bone
its tremendous tensile strength so when
it comes to the exercises for bone
health none of these exercises are going
to mean much without consistency where
you need to be willing to consistently
stimulate the bone tissue in order to
gain and maintain these long-term
adaptations and with all this talk about
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description below so finally back to
these exercises that could stimulate the
bones with both compressive and tensile
forces so usually how I go about this is
I'll ask students can you come up with
some ideas that would put a pushing or a
compressive force on the bones and
usually the students will answer that
pretty quickly they'll say things like
walking running and jumping and those
are definitely correct answers those
would put a pushing or a compressive
force on the boom obviously running and
jumping mean more intense and creating a
greater stimulus and say like walking
but then I'll say what about a pulling
force can you think of activities or
exercises that would create a pulling
force on the muscle they often will
think a little bit longer about that but
usually come up with things like
resistance training maybe like a pull-up
or a biceps curl and so let's use the
biceps curl as an example and we'll use
my biceps forgive me my I'm not a very
big specimen here but this is where my
biceps is and when the biceps muscle
belly contracts the tendon of the biceps
would attach down to the bone and as
that muscle belly contracts that tendon
would Yank on the bone and create a
pulling force on the actual bum and so
you can see those are pretty
straightforward examples but the
interesting thing about that is it's
actually even easier than you think
very creative to put both a compressive
and a tensile force on the bones and let
me explain why so let's say we're all
out together frolicking in the forest
and we're picking up sticks and breaking
and snapping sticks so instead I'll use
cornelius's radius here thank you
Cornelius and I'm going to bend it don't
worry it's not going to snap Cornelius
is a synthetic skeleton although Jeffrey
over here to the left is losing its mind
because his bone would snap if we did
this but I want you guys to look at that
bone the top part of that bone would be
being pulled apart or under a tensile
force if you could see that whereas the
bottom part of that bone would be under
a compressive or being smooshed together
a compressive Force so apply that to a
biceps curl yes that biceps tendon is
going to yank on the bone there but
think about the weight trying to push
downward this would create that bending
or bowing now granted it doesn't really
Bend because the Bone's strong enough to
resist this but the forces would create
a tensile force on the top and a
compressive force on the bottom also
think about that with something like
running we go to our femurs here notice
that the femurs are actually angled
Inward and that's even a little bit more
dramatic on say like a female pelvis but
because of that angling inward the femur
every time you step it would kind of
create that bowing Force again doesn't
bow in real life because the Bone's
strong enough to do deal with that
usually and we're going to have that
outside of the bone dealing with a
tensile force with the inside of the
bone dealing with a compressive Force so
as you can see the majority of the
activities that you would choose to
participate in in an exercise program
would actually do a pretty good job at
stimulating the bones in both ways so
what do we do with all this information
in the details we just talked about well
one it's pretty cool just to learn more
about the human body but I will concede
I'm a little biased to that but two we
pretty much just went over the idea that
the majority of exercises that you can
choose from will stimulate the bones
with both compressive and tensile forces
so do we really need to get lost in the
details of exercise choices like does it
matter if we do a biceps curl versus a
chin up or say like do we have to
actually pound the pavement with running
or are there other ways to stimulate
this and the answer is there are
multiple ways to do this as you're
probably already guessed and so what the
main focus is is these general
principles now granted you can get
nuanced with different type of exercise
choices based upon strength goals and
other type of fitness goals when it
comes to bone health with muscular
training or resistance training you want
to do something that's at least a
moderate level of intensity so like if
you could curl a weight like 25 times
it's probably not intense enough you
could probably increase the intensity a
bit which would mean increase the weight
and this is still a little bit of a wide
range but I kind of live in this area
like say something that's you could lift
six to even up to 12 times obviously if
you pick a weight that you could only
lift it six times you're gonna increase
the intensity and the stimulus and
obviously kind of build more of go into
that strength training realm but six to
twelve reps you would tend to get a
benefit there with increasing and
maintaining bone density the other
question is would you have to actually
pound the pavement and run does running
provide a stimulus absolutely Runners
who don't lift a lot of Weights will
actually have great bone density in
their lower limbs now ideally I think
it's great to have a combination of both
some sort of endurance training mixed
with weight training now if people don't
love running compare that to say like a
cyclist cycling doesn't create a lot of
impact and pounding on the pavement but
you would be hard-pressed to say find a
cyclist that didn't have good bone
density so we're kind of answering our
question here you don't have to pound
the pavement granted it creates a great
stimulus but you could simulate that
through say like squats deadlifts really
Contracting those lower limb muscles to
pull on those lower limb bones as well
as well as also create that kind of
bending and compressive intensile force
that we talked about earlier today now
also keep in mind if you're going to
kind of lean towards the weight training
area I think again this is good for
everybody you want to balance the whole
body you want to train all the muscle
groups of the Upper Limb the lower limb
as well as your trunk and core muscles
so let's wrap this up with some final
cool details as well as a point of
clarification I just want to be clear
that we know that the bones are
constantly being remodeled regardless of
the amount of exercise you're doing the
bones are constantly having old bone
tissue be resorbed and then new bone
tissue being laid down in its place so
constantly turning over the bone tissue
and there's some really cool bone cells
that get involved in this one of the
cells is called an osteoblast and the
osteoblast build up or lay down new bone
tissue essentially prepare that Matrix
of collagen and hydroxyapatite the other
cell called the osteoclast will actually
resorb or break down bone tissue so you
have these two cell types that kind of
oppose each other so if you think about
it this way the osteoblasts and the
osteoclasts if they're pacing each other
or that their activity matches your bone
density will stay the same say somebody
decides to start exercising though and
the osteoblasts start outpacing the
osteoclasts bone density would go up go
back to that example of the astronauts
earlier
no physical activity where they're not
putting a lot of stress and strain on
the bone those osteoclasts would outpace
the osteoblasts and bone density would
go down so kind of interesting to see
those different cell types and how
they're active throughout this whole
process now one thing that's really
interesting kind of a little bit of a
food for thought or a little teaser for
a future video estrogen tends to inhibit
those osteoclasts and so think about
that from the female perspective as far
as what would happen during a certain
time of their life if estrogen levels
were to go down but we'll save that for
another video and touch on that a little
bit later but thanks for watching
everyone if you're interested in
checking out copilot that link is in the
description below as always we love
reading your comments go ahead and throw
some of those comments in about what you
think estrogen in the osteoclasts
relationship might do like and subscribe
if you feel the need and of course we'll
see in the next video
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