An Iowa State professor's discovery of a treatment to help AIDS patients gain muscle mass was unveiled to 12,000 scientists and activists at the World AIDS Conference in Geneva this July. Steven Nissen, professor of animal science and founder of MTI BioTech Inc., located in the ISU Research Park, invented Juven, a dietary supplement. Nissen said the product will help slow the muscle deterioration process.
Muscle loss occurs when disease or trauma places additional nutritional demands on the body.
These stresses can diminish appetite, causing the body to use protein from muscle stores. Over time, muscles become smaller, weaker and less flexible, according to a press release. We breathe through muscles, and if you can't cough you get pneumonia. The clinical study involved AIDS patients who had lost at least 5 percent of their body weight during the preceding two months and compared patients taking Juven to those taking a placebo in a double-blind test. We designed the product to protect these patients from further loss, so we assumed that as our body of data grew, the results would level out.