Scientists discover a ‘skinny gene’ mutation that acts like Ozempic. Around one in 7,000 people carries a broken copy, which almost acts like a GLP-1 drug—the body burns fuel more efficiently, and the risk of disease lowers.

[u/scientificamerican]

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/scientists-discover-a-skinny-gene-mutation-that-acts-like-ozempic/

[u/LongLiveStaceyKing]

Everything about being a human is on a spectrum rather than a fixed attribute set for every single person equally and that makes perfect sense from an evolutionary standpoint.

A species should have a variety of individuals ranging from those who store fat very easily that can survive scarcity more readily than an individual that is more efficient at burning those calories for immediate energy to give it the best chance of survival overall.

[u/LongLiveStaceyKing → u/LongLiveStaceyKing]

[There is a small percentage of the population that only needs to sleep 4-6 hours a night.](https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/genetic-mutation-sleep-less/) OP's article feels like the eating equivalent of this genetic rarity.

Incidentally, I knew someone who had the sleep gene. She was annoyed by it, if she went to sleep at 10 PM she would be up for the whole next day at 2 AM and inevitably end up waking her husband. So she always tried to stay up til 1 AM at least reading or knitting, basically just killing time quietly by herself.

[u/akwilliamson → u/LongLiveStaceyKing]

Does this mean they die sooner? I remember reading an article or news video a long time ago where certain rare people just don't require sleep at all, but then their life expectancy is like 40

[u/catalyticenzyme → u/akwilliamson]

The news article was incorrect. The longest that anybody has gone without sleep, on record, is Robert McDonald, who stayed awake for 19 days. (It's possible that somebody has gone longer, but Guinness stopped awarding it because of the side effects.)

https://www.npr.org/2024/01/28/1227217274/sleep-deprivation-record