Susanna Søberg
A researcher at the University of Copenhagen whose work focuses on cold and heat exposure and metabolic health. She proposed the Søberg Principle, which holds that a cold exposure session should be used to end a heat exposure session.
Timeline (last 90 days)
The key is not the cold itself, but the effect of temperature change (cold-heat contrast) on metabolic health.
Using infrared thermal imaging, Søberg observed that after 4 minutes of immersion in 4°C cold water, the temperature of brown fat in the supraclavicular region rose markedly.
Søberg proposes the "end with cold" principle: ending with cold exposure, the body continues to generate heat on its own for hours afterward, brown fat and muscle cells remain active, and mitochondrial number and efficiency increase accordingly.
In his research, Søberg found that winter swimmers' skin temperature at rest was higher than that of the control group.
Søberg's doctoral research protocol was: 2 to 3 times per week, each time 1 to 2 minutes of cold water immersion (3 rounds in total), 10 to 15 minutes in an 80°C sauna, and always ending with cold, amounting to about 11 minutes of total cold water time per week and about 57 minutes of sauna.
Hormesis refers to a dose-response phenomenon in which a low-dose stressor produces beneficial adaptation in an organism while a high dose is instead harmful; Søberg regards cold and heat exposure as a form of hormesis whose dose has an inverted U-shaped optimal range.
Søberg believes that the reduction in inflammation levels may be a key mediator of improved blood pressure, insulin sensitivity and glucose balance and of reduced risk of metabolic diseases such as type 2 diabetes, but she explicitly treats the link between inflammation and depression, anxiety and Alzheimer's disease as an inferential extrapolation rather than a conclusion directly confirmed by her research.
All Facts (7)
The key is not the cold itself, but the effect of temperature change (cold-heat contrast) on metabolic health.
50%UnverifiedUsing infrared thermal imaging, Søberg observed that after 4 minutes of immersion in 4°C cold water, the temperature of brown fat in the supraclavicular region rose markedly.
50%UnverifiedSøberg proposes the "end with cold" principle: ending with cold exposure, the body continues to generate heat on its own for hours afterward, brown fat and muscle cells remain active, and mitochondrial number and efficiency increase accordingly.
50%UnverifiedIn his research, Søberg found that winter swimmers' skin temperature at rest was higher than that of the control group.
50%UnverifiedSøberg's doctoral research protocol was: 2 to 3 times per week, each time 1 to 2 minutes of cold water immersion (3 rounds in total), 10 to 15 minutes in an 80°C sauna, and always ending with cold, amounting to about 11 minutes of total cold water time per week and about 57 minutes of sauna.
50%UnverifiedHormesis refers to a dose-response phenomenon in which a low-dose stressor produces beneficial adaptation in an organism while a high dose is instead harmful; Søberg regards cold and heat exposure as a form of hormesis whose dose has an inverted U-shaped optimal range.
50%UnverifiedSøberg believes that the reduction in inflammation levels may be a key mediator of improved blood pressure, insulin sensitivity and glucose balance and of reduced risk of metabolic diseases such as type 2 diabetes, but she explicitly treats the link between inflammation and depression, anxiety and Alzheimer's disease as an inferential extrapolation rather than a conclusion directly confirmed by her research.
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