Changes in body composition and average daily energy expenditure of men and women during arduous extended polar travel

Adrian  Wilson; Robert M  Gifford; Henry  Crosby; Sarah Davey; Natalie  Taylor; Mike  Eager; C Douglas Thake; Christopher  Imray

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0308804

Changes in body composition and average daily energy expenditure of men and women during arduous extended polar travel

Adrian Wilson, Robert M Gifford, Henry Crosby, Sarah Davey, Natalie Taylor, Mike Eager, C Douglas Thake, Christopher Imray

Centre for Physical Activity, Sport and Exercise Sciences

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Abstract

Weight and skin-fold measurements were made at five-day intervals during a 47-day expedition by six men and three women from the edge of the sea ice to the South Pole. From these, together with detailed manual records of the nutrition for individual participants, the average daily energy expenditure was determined before and after a resupply at approximately mid-point of the expedition. For all participants body weight fell during the expedition with the overall loss being much smaller for the three female participants (-4.0, -4.0, -4.4kg) than for the male participants, (mean±sd) -8.6±2.0kg. Fat weight fell approximately linearly during the expedition with a total loss of (-4.1, -6.5 and -2.5kg) for the three female participants and -6.8±1.7kg for the male participants. Individual fat-free weight changed by a smaller amount overall: (0.13, 2.5 and -1.8kg) for the three female participants; -1.8±2.0kg for the male participants who, with one exception, lost fat-free tissue All participants showed a substantial variation in fat-free tissue weight during the expedition. Analysis of the daily energy expenditure showed adequate nutrition but the intake fell for the second part of the expedition although the reasons for this are unclear, but adaptation to the cold, altitude and workload are possible explanations. The validity of this time-averaged measurement for individual participants was determined from analysing moments about the mean of time-series actigraphy data from wrist worn devices. The mean and autocorrelation function of the actigraphy data across subjects were analysed to determine whether measures could be compared between participants. The first, second and third moment about the mean of the day-to-day activity was found to be time-invariant for individual subjects (χ2, p>0.05) and the normalized mean and autocorrelation measured over a day for each participant indistinguishable from the mean of the group (χ2, p>0.05) allowing both longitudinal and cross-sectional analysis.

Original language	English
Article number	e0308804
Number of pages	21
Journal	PLoS ONE
Volume	19
Issue number	10
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0308804
Publication status	Published - 10 Oct 2024

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
Copyright: © 2024 Wilson et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Funding

The scientific study was principally funded by a grant from the UK Ministry of Defence, Royal Centre of Defence (RCDM) https://www.uhb.nhs.uk/services/royal-centre-for-defence-medicine/ and sponsored by the department of Research and Clinical Innovation, RCDM (awarded to RG and NT). The study was also generously supported by the Drummond Foundation, a committee of the Royal Army Medical Corps charity (https://www.ramcassociation.org.uk/) which awarded a donation (to NT) from non-public funds. In addition, the study received support from the women in ground close combat study funded by the Ministry of Defence (ref: ASC task 108, awarded to RG). Civilian funding for the scientific study came from: The Charles Swithinbank Award to the Inspire-22 expedition from the Andrew Croft Memorial Fund (https://www.acmf.org.uk/), the Mount Everest Foundation (https://www.mef.org.uk/ Ref: 22/03, awarded to CI), the Gino Watkins Memorial Fund (https://www.spri.cam.ac.uk/about/funding/ginowatkins/, awarded to CI), and the JABBS Foundation (awarded to CI). Commercial and individual philanthropic support for expedition and on-ice logistics was provided by (in alphabetical order): AlleyCorp (https://alleycorp.com); Empatica Inc. (https://www.empatica.com); FJ Labs (https://fjlabs.com); Fabrice Grinda (https://fabricegrinda.com); Taavet Hinrikus; Jack Kreindler; Medable Inc. (https://www.medable.com); ⁠OzCo Building Products (https://ozcobp.com); Arnis Ozol (https://www.ozoco.eu); Plural UK Management Ltd., (https://pluralplatform.com); Printify Inc., (https://printify.com); Kevin Ryan; WellFounded.Health Ltd., (https://wellfounded.health) None of the scientific nor expedition funders had any role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. None of the authors received personal support from any of the funders All commercial and philanthropic support for the expedition was applied for and awarded to the Inspire-22 expedition.

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Cite this

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title = "Changes in body composition and average daily energy expenditure of men and women during arduous extended polar travel",

abstract = "Weight and skin-fold measurements were made at five-day intervals during a 47-day expedition by six men and three women from the edge of the sea ice to the South Pole. From these, together with detailed manual records of the nutrition for individual participants, the average daily energy expenditure was determined before and after a resupply at approximately mid-point of the expedition. For all participants body weight fell during the expedition with the overall loss being much smaller for the three female participants (-4.0, -4.0, -4.4kg) than for the male participants, (mean±sd) -8.6±2.0kg. Fat weight fell approximately linearly during the expedition with a total loss of (-4.1, -6.5 and -2.5kg) for the three female participants and -6.8±1.7kg for the male participants. Individual fat-free weight changed by a smaller amount overall: (0.13, 2.5 and -1.8kg) for the three female participants; -1.8±2.0kg for the male participants who, with one exception, lost fat-free tissue All participants showed a substantial variation in fat-free tissue weight during the expedition. Analysis of the daily energy expenditure showed adequate nutrition but the intake fell for the second part of the expedition although the reasons for this are unclear, but adaptation to the cold, altitude and workload are possible explanations. The validity of this time-averaged measurement for individual participants was determined from analysing moments about the mean of time-series actigraphy data from wrist worn devices. The mean and autocorrelation function of the actigraphy data across subjects were analysed to determine whether measures could be compared between participants. The first, second and third moment about the mean of the day-to-day activity was found to be time-invariant for individual subjects (χ2, p>0.05) and the normalized mean and autocorrelation measured over a day for each participant indistinguishable from the mean of the group (χ2, p>0.05) allowing both longitudinal and cross-sectional analysis.",

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AU - Eager, Mike

AU - Thake, C Douglas

AU - Imray, Christopher

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Changes in body composition and average daily energy expenditure of men and women during arduous extended polar travel

Abstract

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Funding

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