CSEP 2020 Conference Symposia Chair Feature with Dr. Christopher Perry

August 14, 2020

There is a great line-up of Symposia to look forward to at CSEP 2020 Online: Strengthening our Performance; Keeping our Connections. We’ve interviewed each symposia chair to give you a preview of what to expect and how attending will benefit you.

In this feature we talk to Dr. Christopher Perry from York University, who is chairing the symposium “New advances in understanding mitochondrial adaptations to exercise” at CSEP 2020.

What can CSEP certified members learn from attending the session you’re chairing that they can apply to their practice?

Many clients want to know how exercise improve their health and fitness. While there are many reasons for how the body becomes more fit with exercise, this session will address how muscle contraction improves the ability of skeletal muscle to produce energy within mitochondria (the ‘powerhouse’ of the cell). A specific emphasis on recent advances in this field will provide attendees with new insights into how mitochondria contribute to our fitness.

What do you think makes this topic and the content unique to the CSEP conference?

The topic focuses on two important questions: how does exercise improve the quality of mitochondria, and how do mitochondrial adaptations reciprocate to improve muscle health and fitness? The topics in this session will address two concepts that have not been taught in most university or college kinesiology courses. First, most exercise physiologists are unaware that mitochondria use creatine to produce energy through a slow and sustained manner in addition to the classic teachings of how creatine determines strength and power. Second, we now know that exercise improves mitochondrial quality by increasing the turnover of mitochondria (production AND ‘helpful’ degradation). The session also highlights interesting findings that address whether males and females respond differently to exercise, at least at the mitochondrial level. What does this mean for understanding sex-differences in exercise metabolism? This is all very interesting and will equip CSEP members with new answers to some of the questions that can be asked by clients.

CSEP 2020 will be 100% online this year; how do you think this will affect your session?

This might be a good thing for such a popular topic! Past sessions on mitochondrial responses to exercise left people standing by the doors due to an over-whelming interest. We will now be able to share the topic with many more people. Come one, come all!