Wednesday, July 21, 2010

How to increase the height of your child

In my previous article about increasing kids height, I wrote more about increasing growth rate.  In this article, I'm going to write about how to increase your height at every stage of development.

How do we grow taller?  In long bones: stem cell proliferation + differentiation and chondrocyte proliferation + differentiation, and transport of new stem cells into the hyaline cartilage growth plate line.  In short bones:  Stem cell proliferation + differentiation and osteoblast proliferation + differentiation.  Their are also mesenchymal precursor cells that we can try to target as well.  It should be noted that most methods involving chondrocyte proliferation have been relatively unsuccessful due to a likely limited proliferative capacity of chondrocytes.  For long bones, you need to increase stem cell proliferation or get new stem cells.

How do we alter these factors?

In an embryo, you can alter genes.  You can also alter genes in adults as well(mutagenics).  You would want to alter genes that inhibit myostatin, enhance sensitivity to insulin and IGF-1, and enhance expression of the C-type natriuretic peptide.

With a baby, there's not much you can do.  A baby can't really exercise.  You can perform LSJL on baby.  Very light like with your thumb.  Adults grow from 10 to 20 times the size they were when they were a baby.  The impact of what you do for a baby could be multiplied by 10 or 20 times.  A baby is very soft and spongy with hyaline cartilage instead of bones.  If you alter genetic expression of the hyaline cartilage by very light lateral loading and increase fluid flow by that same loading how much of an impact do you think that could have later in life?  Mechanical loading has been shown to enhance cell proliferation.

For a kid, there's more you can do.  First, you want to make sure that estrogen levels are in the proper range to maximize cellular proliferation.  Testosterone inhibits Myostatin and myostatin inhibits cellular proliferation. So you can increase testosterone.  Of course, to do that you need advanced equipment to properly monitor levels of these factors.  If a doctor injects you with HGH or IGF-1 to stimulate cellular proliferation then you want to make sure that the body is responding and their effect is not diminished by negative feedback.  There is one cheap way however to increase a lot of anabolic factors.

Lithium.  Lithium has one outer electron and is highly reactive.  Lithium increases stem cell proliferation.

Exercise.  Exercise increases insulin sensitivity which increases cellular proliferation by the PI3K pathway.  Exercise increases sensitivity to IGF-1 and induces hypoxia(lack of oxygen) which is also anabolic.

There's also body fat percentage.  There's an optimal estrogen range to maximize cellular proliferation and too much or too little fat can affect that(fat cells produce estrogen).  Too much body fat inhibits your insulin sensitivity.  Body fat increases leptin which affects osteoblasts and chondrocytes so that is important as well.

You can also perform LSJL on kids but with more intensity.  Kids can also perform mechanical loading which again is highly anabolic to bone.  I know the common belief is no weight lifting before age 13 but it's much safer for a kid to weight train then it is to play a sport like football where you can't control what's going on.  Injuries can happen in any sport and weight lifting is safer due to the nature of it not involving the chaos of other people.  Compressive loading slows down growth rate but does not decrease final growth.  Weight lifting doesn't seem to increase growth on it's own but compressive loading increases vascularization to the growth plate and could enable easier delivery of new MSCs to the hyaline cartilage growth plate line via LSJL.  Loading of the muscles and the periosteum also alters genetic expression further encouraging anabolism.  And loading the bones could alter the PI3K pathway making it more sensitive to insulin and IGF-1.

So the younger you are the more options available for you to increase your height.  As you get older, you need to get all new stem cells into the hyaline cartilage by trabecular microfracture of the epiphysis.  But if you're younger, it's enough to enhance cellular proliferation of existing stem cells in the resting cell of the growth plate line and increase levels and enhance sensitivity through manipulation of various hormones or mechanical stimuli.

1 comment:

  1. Hi tyler,

    so if i were to perform LSJL,do i have to tap/impact the target area, apart from just applying pressure in order to cause microfracture. Or what u have done so far to ur knee and ankle areas are just pressure loading only?

    Also, your height still reflects 5'9 and 1/4 when u measure at night? Are ur measurement method same as before u started ur LSJL routine.

    Please forgive me for being intrusive. Nice work here. Thanks