Does taking rapamycin mess up exercise benefits in mice?
Rapamycin Does Not Compromise Exercise‐Induced Muscular Adaptations in Female Mice
Not medical advice. For informational purposes only. Always consult a healthcare professional. Terms
We gave lady mice medicine called rapamycin either once a week or three times a week while they ran on special wheels for 8 weeks. We wanted to see if the medicine changed how strong or healthy they got from running.
Surprising Findings
Exercise benefits like muscle growth happened even with strong mTORC1 inhibition.
Conventional wisdom says mTORC1 is essential for muscle building — blocking it should stop gains. But here, mice still got stronger despite rapamycin’s known suppression of this pathway.
Practical Takeaways
If using rapamycin, consider intermittent (e.g., once-weekly) dosing to reduce metabolic side effects.
Not medical advice. For informational purposes only. Always consult a healthcare professional. Terms
We gave lady mice medicine called rapamycin either once a week or three times a week while they ran on special wheels for 8 weeks. We wanted to see if the medicine changed how strong or healthy they got from running.
Surprising Findings
Exercise benefits like muscle growth happened even with strong mTORC1 inhibition.
Conventional wisdom says mTORC1 is essential for muscle building — blocking it should stop gains. But here, mice still got stronger despite rapamycin’s known suppression of this pathway.
Practical Takeaways
If using rapamycin, consider intermittent (e.g., once-weekly) dosing to reduce metabolic side effects.
Publication
Journal
Aging Cell
Year
2025
Authors
Christian J. Elliehausen, Szczepan S Olszewski, D. Minton, Carolyn G Shult, Aditya R. Ailiani, Michaela E Trautman, Reji Babygirija, Dudley Lamming, Troy A. Hornberger, Adam R. Konopka
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Claims (6)
Even when taking rapamycin, female mice still get stronger and fitter from using a weighted exercise wheel — the drug doesn't stop their workout gains.
In female mice that exercised with weighted wheels for 8 weeks, taking the drug rapamycin — even just once a week — made their blood sugar control worse, but doing it less often caused fewer problems.
Female mice on a weekly rapamycin dose ran more and faster than those on a more frequent dose or no drug, but despite running more, they didn’t lose more fat or get healthier metabolically.
Even when mice are given a drug that blocks a key muscle growth pathway, running with added weight still makes their leg muscles bigger — showing that exercise can build muscle even when that pathway is turned down.
In female mice that exercised with weighted wheels for 8 weeks, giving rapamycin three times a week blocked a key muscle signaling pathway, but giving it just once a week let the pathway bounce back a bit between doses — showing that how often you give the drug really changes how it works in muscles.