Shift workers getting too little sleep at the wrong time of day may be increasing their risk of diabetes and obesity, according to researchers.

The team is calling for more measures to reduce the impact of shift working following the results of its study.

Researchers controlled the lives of 21 people, including meal and bedtimes.

The results, published in Science Translational Medicine, showed changes to normal sleep meant the body struggled to control sugar levels.

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Tried and true methods work best for losing weight If you’re trying to slim down for summer, new study findings suggest you’ll do better if you stay clear of popular diets and diet foods. According to the study, successful “losers” followed tried and true methods: they ate less fat, exercised more and some joined a weight loss program.

One in four Canadians are obese and roughly 60 per cent are trying to lose weight. Given the fact that the vast majority of people who lose weight regain all or even more pounds after weight loss efforts, it’s important to pinpoint strategies that work.

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If you often eat too much because breakfast has not filled you up, researchers say they could have the answer – seaweed bread.

The healthier loaf can help make you feel fuller and reduce the amount you eat during the day.

Men who ate seaweed bread for breakfast consumed 179 fewer calories during a day – equivalent to a treadmill workout.

Seaweed replicates the taste of salt in bread but contains far less sodium. A low-sodium diet reduces the risk of heart disease and stroke.

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Diet supplements are often advertised as ‘extreme fat burners’ or ‘craving quashers’. But evidence used to support these claims simply doesn’t add up, a leading U.S nutrition expert has warned.

Professor Melinda Manore from Oregon State University analysed the research used to support hundreds of diet pill claims.

She found no evidence that any single product was a ‘wonder pill’ causing significant weight loss and found some even had detrimental health effects.

‘What people want is to lose weight and maintain or increase lean tissue mass,’ Prof Manore said.

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There’s no shortage of diet plans promising to melt away the pounds by calling for strict proportions of protein, carbohydrate and fat.

But, according to a new study, it doesn’t matter where the calories come from. What matters most for shedding body fat is simply eating fewer calories – and sticking to your plan, be it high protein, low carb or low fat.

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As a recipe for losing weight, tucking into a slice of chocolate cake at breakfast would seem an unlikely fantasy.

But a full breakfast that includes a sweet treat really can contribute to weight loss success, researchers claim.

A team from Tel Aviv University found that eating pudding as part of a balanced 600-calorie breakfast that also includes proteins and carbohydrates, can help dieters to lose more weight – and keep it off in the long run.

The key is to indulge in the morning, when the body’s metabolism is at its most active and we are better able to work off the extra calories throughout the day, according to Professor Daniela Jakubowicz and her team.

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Just looking at a picture of delicious food makes you hungry, experts have discovered.

They also claim that the mouthwatering images may be part of the reason for Britain’s growing obesity epidemic – and that people trying to lose weight should avoid looking at them.

Researchers in Germany have revealed it only takes a picture of tempting food to cause a change in the level of hormones that control our appetite.

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We’re always being told that the best way to lose weight is to eat less and exercise more. But escalating obesity figures in Britain are testament to the fact that dieting isn’t that simple.

This week scientists renewed their attack on the calorie-counting process, criticising it for being too complicated.

With low-fat and low-sugar foods regularly masking more calories than their unadulterated counterparts, and some supposedly healthy foods (such as muesli, cereal bars, even salads) packing more calories than chocolate and cakes, it’s not surprising we’re confused — or that so many diets fail.

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If you’re a woman trying to lose weight by following a low-calorie diet, eating a snack between breakfast and lunch could undermine your progress.

That’s the take-away message from a new study published in the December issue of the Journal of the American Dietetic Association. In the year-long study, mid-morning snackers saw their pounds come off much more slowly than women who ate a healthy breakfast but did not snack before lunch.

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Wouldn’t it be nice to get the benefits of a vigorous workout without having to sweat.

Some years ago, Clinton Rubin, a biomechanical engineer at the State University of New York at Stony Brook, set out to develop a non-drug treatment that could mimic the bone-building action of exercise. His research resulted in a compact platform, called the Juvent 1,000, that produces tiny up and down vibrations. Simply stand on the device, and the shaking motion is supposed to make muscles contract and put tiny stresses on the skeletal structure, leading to bone-building activity – just like real exercise.

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