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WebMD article mentions microstrain to get taller

There’s an article on WEB MD called Best Exercises for Leg Length Discrepancy. It was reviewed by a medical doctor Dan Brennan.

From the article:

“Certain exercises and stretches may help minimize leg length discrepancy and ease any related symptoms.”

“Physical force can cause micro strains on your bones, which results in incremental changes in bone mass and length — especially if the exercise is repeated over time. “

I’ve studied microstrain in the past and I believe that microstrain is a tool that can be used to make people taller. Either by alterations in the fluid forces in the bone, by inducing plastic deformation, complete trabecular microfractures resulting in endochondral ossification one trabeculae at a time, or piezoelectric forces modifying osteoclast and osteoblast activity.

“One exercise that can put this kind of strain on your affected leg bones is side kicking into the air. To get the most out of this exercise, do multiple sets daily.”<-Is side kicking into the air going to cause the right forces to induce height growth? I’m not one to discount any potential height increase method. But I would at least like to see some anecdotal evidence for this if not some kind of study. I don’t know if you could get animals to side kick in the air. And I think it would be hard for humans to get the right technique as you’d want the right kind of microstrain. I assume the goal would be tensile plastic deformation gradually lengthening the bone one microstrain at a time or piezoelectric forces altering osteoblast and osteoclast activity such that the bone is remodeled in a more lengthened state.

The article also mentions a quadriceps left and hamstring stretch which I do not think are related to lengthening bones.

Here are the sources mentioned in the study:

Arthritis and Rheumatology: “Brief Report: Leg Length Inequality and Hip Osteoarthritis in the Multicenter Osteoarthritis Study and the Osteoarthritis Initiative.”

European Cells and Materials: “Mechanical Loading and How It Affects Bone Cells: The Role of the Osteocyte Cytoskeleton in Maintaining Our Skeleton.”

International Research Journal of Engineering, IT & Scientific Research: “Relationship between length of leg and strength of leg muscle to frequency of straight kicks.”

Journal of Athletic Training: “Standing and Supine Hamstring Stretching Are Equally Effective.”

Journal of International Medical Research: “Post-THA gait training to improve pelvic obliquity and decrease leg length discrepancy in DDH patients: a retrospective study.”

From Mechanical Loading and How It Affects Bone Cells: The Role of the Osteocyte Cytoskeleton in Maintaining Our Skeleton, “”1,000 microstrain equals a 0.01 % change in length of the bone compared to its original length. Vigorous exercise induces bone strains up to 1,000 microstrain in humans.”<-but this will only be a permanent increase in length if the 0.01% change in length is plastic. If the change in length is elastic it will return to it’s original length like a rubber band.

This study Relationship between length of leg and strength of leg muscle to frequency of straight kicks, I could not find anything that would suggest that kicking would increase legs.

This study Post-THA gait training to improve pelvic obliquity and decrease leg length discrepancy in DDH patients: a retrospective study, was more about functional limb lengthening discrepancy. “Gait training after surgery is one method to correct functional LLD.” i.e. limb lengthening discrepancy due to improper mechanics rather than actual bone length.

The other studies I can’t see how there would be any connection at all.

I found his email and sent him one if he wants to respond

Is it possible to use cardarine to grow taller?

Cardarine has been used by bodybuilders and is linked to height growth. Cardarine is a PPAR Delta agonist(activator).

PPARDelta has been linked to height. From A single nucleotide polymorphism on exon-4 of the gene encoding PPARdelta is associated with reduced height in adults and children.  “compelling evidence was found for this locus and its association with height (P = 10(-8)) with an overall effect size of about 0.5 cm per allele{1cm total}.” It’s possible that the effects of PPARdelta are biphasic where there is an equilibrium amount to maximize height and too little or too much reduces height or that there is a minimum amount of PPARDelta activation that is needed for height and that any further has no effect. The authors speculate that PPARDelta may affect height via metabolic efficiency or via affects on osteoclast function. Metabolic efficiency would have no effect on height as an adult but there is potential if it affects osteoclast function as degradation of bone would be a needed step to grow taller as an adult as it would both make the bone more susceptible to plastic deformation and allow for tissues that are capable of interstitial growth to take the place of bone.

Obviously, 1 cm in height is not going to break the bank in terms of increasing height while skeletally immature but if a PPARdelta agonist can increase osteoclast activity that can be used as part of a height increase routine.

Here’s the studies that says PPAR affects osteoclasts

Cloning and function of rabbit peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor delta/beta in mature osteoclasts

“Osteoclasts modulate bone resorption under physiological and pathological conditions. Previously, we showed that both estrogens and retinoids regulated osteoclastic bone resorption and postulated that such regulation was directly mediated through their cognate receptors expressed in mature osteoclasts. In this study, we searched for expression of other members of the nuclear hormone receptor superfamily in osteoclasts. Using the low stringency homologous hybridization method, we isolated the peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor delta/beta (PPARdelta/beta) cDNA from mature rabbit osteoclasts. Northern blot analysis showed that PPARdelta/beta mRNA was highly expressed in highly enriched rabbit osteoclasts. Carbaprostacyclin, a prostacyclin analogue known to be a ligand for PPARdelta/beta, significantly induced both bone-resorbing activities of isolated mature rabbit osteoclasts and mRNA expression of the cathepsin K, carbonic anhydrase type II, and tartrate-resistant acid phosphatase genes in these cells. Moreover, the carbaprostacyclin-induced bone resorption was completely blocked by an antisense phosphothiorate oligodeoxynucleotide of PPARdelta/beta but not by the sense phosphothiorate oligodeoxynucleotide of the same DNA sequence. Our results suggest that PPARdelta/beta may be involved in direct modulation of osteoclastic bone resorption.“

Here’s the other study:

PPAR agonists modulate human osteoclast formation and activity in vitro

“Peroxisome proliferator-activated receptors (PPARs) are members of the nuclear steroid hormone superfamily and exist in three isoforms: PPARalpha, beta and gamma, each with specific functions. In this study, we have investigated the expression of PPARs by human osteoclast precursors and osteoclasts generated in vitro. In addition, the effects of fibrates and isoform-specific PPAR agonists on osteoclast formation and resorption in vitro were determined. Human peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) were stimulated with human recombinant RANKL and M-CSF to generate osteoclasts. RNA was extracted at days 0, 7, 14 and 21 and RT-PCR for all three PPAR isoforms demonstrated their expression throughout this culture period. To determine the effect on osteoclast formation, PPAR agonists (10(-8) M to 10(-5) M) were added from the beginning of the culture until day 14 and the number of multinucleated osteoclasts counted. The effect of PPAR agonists on osteoclast function was similarly determined by treating mature, multinucleated osteoclasts cultured on dentine wafers with PPAR agonists (10(-8) M to 10(-5) M) for 7 days and quantifying resorption. Bezafibrate and fenofibrate, which non-discriminately activate all PPAR isoforms, significantly inhibited the formation of multinucleated osteoclasts from PBMC in vitro. Bezafibrate treatment of mature osteoclast resulted in 50% inhibition (at 10(-8) M and 10(-7) M) of resorption, yet fenofibrate had no significant effect. Activation of individual PPARs with isoform-specific agonist (GW9578, L165041 and ciglitizone which preferentially activate PPARalpha, beta and gamma respectively) resulted in significant dose-dependent inhibition of multinucleated osteoclast formation. Divergent effects on osteoclast resorption were observed; GW9578 had no significant effect on resorption, whereas ciglitizone and L165041 dose-dependently inhibited and stimulated resorption, respectively. These data show for the first time expression of all three PPAR isoforms throughout the development and maturation period of osteoclasts generated from human PBMCs. In addition, we demonstrate that isoform-specific PPAR agonists have strong effects on multinucleation and highly variable effects on bone resorption. In conclusion, this study highlights the potential of PPARs as therapeutic targets in diseases with accelerated osteoclast formation and resorption.”

I couldn’t find any further studies linking PPARDelta to longitudinal bone growth nor can I find any anecdotal cases of people growing taller off of taking cardarine.

Can Flexioss be used to to prove LSJL or Lateral Impact Loading?

Arthur Lazar is someone who has spoken about LSJL in the past on Quora. “Not really. There is 0 evidence for that. The original working experiment was performed on mice – mice growth plates never ossify. MAYBE if someone would develop a machine which can put perfect constant pressure, perfectly shaped for bone area where the pressure is supposed to be, then in theory it could work. But this is a bro-science, so it’s a big MAYBE. But as for now, using clamp, dumbelss or whatever you can use to press at bone would never work.”<-Mice growth plates don’t ossify but they become senescent which is just as bad for growth.

Here’s some more of his thoughts on LSJL: “Yes, I do work on a device for automatic long bone loading method as I believe that the standard lsjl loading (manual with clamps, weights, mpistols) is an invalid approach that lacks consistency, frequency and stability which all was provided with the original, successful experiment.”<-I don’t know what an mpistol is. I believe it is a typo. I don’t know what the original intent is.

“Thank you for your interest, but currently my team is complete and current priority of the projects puts the lsjl idea on the bottom of the list. When I am done with the prototype and IF it will have a desired affect on Flexioss structure (in the terms of force application on the structure) I will publish the design in order to expand the team and get potential investors interested.”

Here’s another set of communications someone had with him.

So the question is should we be using flexioss to try to find the best loading regime to induce the proper stimulation to induce new longitudinal bone growth. I believe personally that the best regime is some kind of lateral impact loading(I believe that tapping the epiphysis would be superior than the diaphysis now but I am trying both). Clamping has a slippage problem which impact does not have. The loads of direct lateral impact are stronger than that occur during normal physiological activities which are more axial.

Lateral impact does occur during boxing both to the hand and to the face and ribcage. Also, it occurs to the feet bones during running(but this depends on whether you are a heel or toe striker). It also happens to bones during muay thai kick boxing.

The problem is that this impact is often at irregular intervals and not targeted to specific areas of the bone such as the epiphysis. The epiphysis is where there is less cortical bone, is close to where the growth plates used to reside in skeletally mature individuals, and is close to the articular cartilage which if stimulated could potentially contribute to height growth. In muay thai you have no control over where you are kicked and if you do kick you are trying to use the strongest part of the bone.

Lateral impact has the potential in my opinion to drive the most fluid forces throughout the bone. Greater than any axial impact certainly due to the pressure gradient of the bone and the epiphysis is the weakest most porous part of the bone so impact to that area has the potential to drive fluid forces throughout the entire bone. Muscular contractions also have the ability to stimulate fluid forces throughout the bone but that is limited by muscular size and strength. Lateral impact also has the ability to gradually induce plastic deformation throughout the bone. Most plastic deformation occurs axially to shorten the bones such as in rickets/paget’s disease etc. Lateral impact loads have the potential to induce plastic deformation in a way such as to lengthen the bones.

Here is the flexioss.

So the question is can we use the flexioss to find the best way to induce lateral plastic deformation in such a way as to lengthen the bones or to induce fluid forces to either induce articular cartilage endochondral ossification or to cause denovo cartilagenous regions within the bone.

In the study Dose-dependent new bone formation by extracorporeal shock wave application on the intact femur of rabbits., they found trabecular bones heaving with cartilagenous tissue which would be huge as bone tissue is not capable of interstitial bone growth.

The manufacturers of flexioss claim that it has properties similar to that of cancellous bone so yes it can potentially be used to find the best loading regime to induce plastic deformation in such a way as to longitudinally lengthen the bone. Obviously, it can’t really be used to mimic the fluid properties of the bone.

McKenzie Chin Tuck a fast and easy trick to be taller

I have tried the McKenzie Chin Tuck posture and it absolutely makes you measure taller but your eye level appears shorter. It is not a breakthrough by any means but I have tried and you can see yourself becoming taller in the mirror when you do it.

So when you adopt this posture you measure taller because you are maximizing the apex bump of your head. But personally, I feel shorter because with a more backwards head posture my eyes are at a higher level so people are shorter relative to high level.

There is an exercise related to this where you push the chin back to get a neck muscle stretch and there are some indications that it may be worthwhile to do this.

I write more in my response to Body Height changes with hyperextension. Basically temporary hyperextension of the spine(15s) can result in temporary height gain due to disc hydration. And I think this exercise may achieve hyperextension of disc components. So I’d say it’s worth doing but only brief periods as you would be better suited to strengthening your neck muscles via something like free weight training or machines if you can’t do free weights due to injury or a structural reason.

It’s mentioned further in the body height changes with hyperextension study that it’s putting the load on the facets that enables for disc hydration. You’d think that tilting your head back would actually put the load on the facets. But I think the key is that tucking your chin in achieves neck muscle activation and if you look at the back muscle anatomy if the muscles are activated they will pull everything upwards.

Note that the majority of the back muscles slope upwards so when they are contracted they indirectly pull up the spine in alignment. I write about the muscular pull maximizing height gain here.

So I’d say in general adopt the mckenzie chin tuck along with chest up/shoulders back to maximize back muscle activation in posture. And occasionally do the press the finger against the chin thing for short periods of time to allow for disc hydration.

The drawback for the mckenzie chin tuck posture is that although it makes you measure taller it makes your jaw look smaller.

Here’s a video that explains it more:

I find that just bringing your chin is enough to get a good height gain appearance without having to worry about protecting the technique yes as mentioned you will have double chins but you will measure taller.

This guy looks taller after doing the McKenzie chin tuck:

Here’s a study that backs up the McKenzie chin tuck:

Head posture and loading of the cervical spine

” Precision stadiometer tests were run, using seven subjects, to measure the effects on spinal length of different angles of gaze. After 1 h exposure whilst sitting in a controlled posture, there were significant differences in the shrinkage of the spine between the horizontal gaze and the 20° and 40° angles below the horizontal. The increased spinal loading demonstrated by the increase in spinal shrinkage calls into question the recommendations for angle of gaze recommended in textbooks.”

I think it is the forward posture affecting the height change and not actually the gaze of the eyes.

“The mean compressive load on the cervical discs was 10 kg higher for the forward flexed position”

“Each subject would attend on three separate days, on each of which one of the three
randomly chosen head angles, 0 degree, 20 degrees and 40 degrees, would be tested.”

“A shrinkage of the spine during the forward inclination of the head, observed during this
experiment, of approximately 1 mm over a 1 h period, equivalent to about 5% of the total diurnal shrinkage”

Is LPP(Link Protein N-terminal peptide) a potential height increasing supplement?

I went through the papers to see if there’s any potential. LPP is linked to HMGA2 which does have height increase potential applications.

Link Protein N-Terminal Peptide as a Potential Stimulating Factor for Stem Cell-Based Cartilage Regeneration

<-the title right off the bat suggests potential as anything that suggests cartilage regeneration may be able to increase height if even only in the joints or spinal height.

“Link protein N-terminal peptide (LPP) in extracellular matrix (ECM) of cartilage could induce synthesis of proteoglycans and collagen type II in cartilaginous cells{if the extracellular matrix of the joints or intervertebral discs is thicker that would overall make you taller!}. Cartilage stem/progenitor cells (CSPCs), the endogenous stem cells in cartilage, are important in cartilage degeneration and regeneration. We hypothesized that LPP could be a stimulator for stem cell-based cartilage regeneration by affecting biological behaviors of CSPC.  CSPCs were isolated from rat knee cartilage. We evaluated the promoting effect of LPP on proliferation, migration, and chondrogenic differentiation of CSPCs. The chondrogenic differentiation-related genes and proteins were quantitated. Three-dimensional culture of CSPC was conducted in the presence of TGF-β3 or LPP, and the harvested pellets were analyzed to assess the function of LPP on cartilage regeneration. LPP stimulated the proliferation of CSPC and accelerated the site-directional migration. Higher expression of SOX9, collagen II, and aggrecan were demonstrated in CSPCs treated with LPP. The pellets treated with LPP showed more distinct characteristics of chondroid differentiation than those with TGF-β3. LPP showed application prospect in cartilage regeneration medicine by stimulating proliferation, migration, and chondrogenic differentiation of cartilage stem/progenitor cells.”

So there is a possibility of LPP injects in cartilage regions to make people slightly taller of course with caveats as not everything that has potential works. In the paper there’s a lot about degeneration of articular cartilage so they so the potential for application in that area which would in turn result in potential height increase.

“Link protein, a glycoprotein that exists in human intervertebral discs as well as in the articular cartilage, plays an important role in strengthening the binding between aggrecan and hyaluronan. Link protein N-terminal peptide (LPP) is the cleaved N-terminal 16 amino peptide (DHLSDNYTLDHDRAIH) of link protein. LPP was thought to be the functional fragment of link protein as the cross-linker”

If you look at the doses figure 5 there seems to be an equilibrium effect with around 50ng/mL having the equilibrium effect.

This suggests that if you are not deficient in LPP it may have no impact on height whatsoever(LPP already exists in cartilage regions).

So LPP may have no impact on articular cartilage regions(but that doesn’t mean that it wouldn’t) but there is still the possibility of using LPP to induce stem cell differentiation into chondrocytes. But I don’t think the differentiation of stem cells into chondrocytes is the problem. In distraction osteogenesis there is already chondrogenic differentiation. The problem is likely a lack of stem cells in general in the articular and that bone is not capable of interstitial growth. Perhaps LPP could be used as part of microfracture surgery whose goal is to create microfractures to get stem cells to the articular cartilage but the problem is that the cartilage formed is fibrocartilage. So perhaps LPP could be used to make the cartilage purer.

Bone usually heals by bone remodeling perhaps LPP injections could encourage it to heal via endochondral ossification resulting in taller height over time?

Simultaneous Recruitment of Stem Cells and Chondrocytes Induced by a Functionalized Self-Assembling Peptide Hydrogel Improves Endogenous Cartilage Regeneration

“The goal of treating articular cartilage (AC) injury is to regenerate cartilage tissue and to integrate the neo-cartilage with surrounding host cartilage. However, most current studies tend to focus on engineering cartilage; interface integration has been somewhat neglected. An endogenous regenerative strategy that simultaneously increases the recruitment of bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (BMSCs) and chondrocytes may improve interface integration and cartilage regeneration. In this study, a novel functionalized self-assembling peptide hydrogel (KLD-12/KLD-12-LPP, KLPP) containing link protein N-peptide (LPP) was designed to optimize cartilage repair. KLPP hydrogel was characterized using transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and rheometry. KLPP hydrogel shared a similar microstructure to KLD-12 hydrogel which possesses a nanostructure with a fiber diameter of 25–35 nm. In vitro experiments showed that KLPP hydrogel had little cytotoxicity, and significantly induced chondrocyte migration and increased BMSC migration compared to KLD-12 hydrogel. In vivo results showed that defects treated with KLPP hydrogel had higher overall International Cartilage Repair Society (ICRS) scores, Safranin-O staining scores and cumulative histology scores than untreated defects or defects treated with KLD-12 hydrogel, although defects treated with KLD-12 and KLPP hydrogels received similar type II collagen immunostaining scores. All these findings indicated that the simple injectable functionalized self-assembling peptide hydrogel KLPP facilitated simultaneous recruitment of endogenous chondrocytes and BMSCs to promote interface integration and improve cartilage regeneration, holding great potential as a one-step surgery strategy for endogenous cartilage repair.”

“LPP can induce directional migration of nucleus pulposus cells (NPCs) and cartilage-derived stem cells (CSCs)”

Now is this cartilage “taller” than before the injection? I can’t really tell from the images. IF you look at slide F it looks there might be some slight overgrowth.

Overall I’d say use LPP does have some height increase potential but probably very minor and it’s probably going to be a while before it can be used for height in practice.

Can Regeltec Hydrafil injections make you taller in the spine?

The short answer is yes of course. Loss of spinal height is loss of height. There was a limb lengthening surgery for the spine but it was only for immature pigs. And the growth achieved was very small. There is a growing rods technique for scoliosis patients but the lengthening achieved according to Spinal Lengthening With Magnetically Controlled Growing Rods is something on the order of millimeters. But that adds up.

The intervertebral discs are a component of height. Some people have claimed on forums to get taller in the spine via stretching and I would love to see those claims validated in some way.

Here’s the regeltec website.

Here’s a video with more about the technique:

There was a clinical trial but no results have been posted. I could find some data that the Hydrafil reduced backpain but no data on the impact on height. Of course how much height is added would vary on how much the disc is degenerated. And it would be interesting if you could somehow overfill the disc in order to add height above capacity.

There’s definitely a cost issue as there’s a lot of discs to inject hydrafil into. But there’s no surgery and you just have to inject it that should alleviate the cost. So it may not break the bank but it would probably be a significant sum like all surgical procedures.

But it may be a good non-invasive way to add a little bit of height?