Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by MrBuddyCasino 16 days ago
> we don't even have decent biochemical markers for "fatigue" vs "energy", beyond trivial stuff like blood oxygenation and lactic acid

We do have devices that can measure mitochondrial energy production. There are two I think, forgot their names.

1 comments

Yep, we can measure ATP and so on at the cellular level, but we don't have much of a picture of how that maps onto the physical/psychological sensation of "energy".

Like we know at a crude physical level, we can give someone a bit of a boost with glucose and sympathomimetic stimulants, but sometimes it works a lot better than others. And it's ineffective for fatigue syndromes, but they can't be the other mechanical things commonly associated with fatigue either. (lactic acid, micro-tears and so on).

I really hope we figure that one out soonish. There are so many people affected by these syndromes.