Vibrating your way to weight loss

They are the words we've all been dying to hear; "You can blast fat by just standing still. "

HealthFirst reporter Leslie Toldo is here- probably to tell us what the catch is with this theory.

You stand still, no doubt about it, on a vibrating platform, and researchers at the State University of New York say not only will you lose fat, but you may fight off osteoporosis, too.

Remember vibrating exercise machines that promised weight loss. Sounds silly, right?

Researchers are now studying the effects of vibration with surprising results.

Mice that stood on this platform for 15 minutes a day formed more bone mass and less fat.

"The funny connection between bone and fat is they all come from the same cell," Clinton Rubin, a professor in the Biomedical Engineering Department, said.

That stem cell can become muscle, bone or fat. Scientists believe the gentle vibrations cause the cell to turn into bone to tolerate the jiggling.

"So, it's a different way of thinking about why we become obese," Rubin said.

In this torso scan, the red is fat. The vibrating mouse, seen at the bottom, formed about 30 percent less fat during the study.

The platform also showed promise in humans. Postmenopausal women who stood on the vibrating plate maintained their bone mass, while those who didn't lost about three percent.

Rubin said tennis players are a good example of how shaking leads to bigger bones. They have 35 percent more bone in their playing arms.

These vibrations may one day be a simple way to fight both osteoporosis and obesity -- problems that plague millions of Americans.

Okay now, before you let your imagination run wild, vibrations don't remove fat cells. They help fewer develop. So if you already have fat to get rid of you will still need diet and exercise.

You also need to be careful. The vibrations used in this case are gentle, so filling up your watching machine with tennis shoes and sitting on top is probably not a good idea, and could actually be dangerous for you.

And that would be the catch.

-Source