Yanita McLeay

Citation

Thesis Title
The physiological effects of nutritional thiol supplementation

Read article at Massey Research Online:

The effect of oxidative stress on fatigue and subsequent performance decline in endurance athletes is well known. While previous research has investigated the use of common dietary antioxidants for athletic performance, results are controversial. High in cysteic acid, keratin protein, derived from chicken feathers, has the potential to improve thiol antioxidant status, which may in turn benefit endurance performance. For the very first time this study looked into these physiological measures in humans. Ms McLeay investigated keratins’ potential role in endurance performance whilst also determining the role that thiol antioxidants, such as taurine (a metabolic product of keratin), may have in recovery from resistance exercise. Her results showed keratin could benefit endurance athletes by significantly increasing their proportion of lean body mass over time compared to casein protein. Further, taurine appears to improve certain aspects of muscle force recovery following resistance training.

Supervisors
Professor Steve Stannard
Dr Carlene Starck
Associate Professor Matthew Barnes