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Volume 4, Number 15 - September 6, 2002
Studying Pythons As Couch Potatoes

E-mail Story

 

   A team of University of California at Irvine researchers has found pythons, just like humans, can be rendered sleepy and inactive by the type of food they eat. 

   In particular, meals high in proteins and mixed with some carbohydrates require much more energy to digest than lower protein or single-food meals, so the snakes must rest while digesting because the process requires so much energy. 

   The researchers fed hatchling Burmese pythons a diet of mice and rats for 4 months prior to experiments. Then the baby pythons were fed various meals of proteins, carbohydrates and fats. Meal volumes were varied and feeding was assigned randomly to each python. 

   The researchers found high-protein diets required the most energy and rendered the snakes completely inactive during digestion. 

   The findings could help researchers understand how other animals -- and humans -- metabolize food. 
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Copyright 2002 by United Press International.
All rights reserved.
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