Yoga for Rats

In the 1970s, Dr. K.N. Udupa studied the health effects of yoga on rats. Since rats couldn't be persuaded to adopt yoga poses voluntarily, he kept them upside in glass tubes for one hour daily — simulating the sirasana, or head-stand pose.

Ignoring objections from traditionalists, Dr. Udupa has even initiated tests on rats that are made to simulate a yoga posture. Half a dozen field rats are doing one to two hours a day of sirasana or standing on the head, in openend glass tubes. Wires attached to their tails measure their pulse rate, blood pressure and other metabolic changes.

Stress induced in rats by electric pulses made them irritable and quarrelsome, but after an hour of sirasana they became tranquil and appeared to be contented, Dr. Udupa said.

Bennington Banner - Dec 1, 1975
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source: Stress and its Management by Yoga (1978), by K.N. Udupa

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Alex Boese Alex is the creator and curator of the Museum of Hoaxes. He's also the author of various weird, non-fiction, science-themed books such as Elephants on Acid and Psychedelic Apes. Paul Di Filippo Paul has been paid to put weird ideas into fictional form for over forty years, in his career as a noted science fiction writer. Contact Us

Posted By: Alex - Mon Mar 03, 2025
Category: Animals | Exercise and Fitness | Experiments | 1970s

Comments

I can kinda see that. If you hit me with a Taser, I'm definitely going to be "irritable and quarrelsome." Someone powerful enough to hang me up by my toes is going to find me amendable (not "contented" nor "tranquil," but I'm definitely not going to do again whatever led to me being stood on my head).

Posted by Phideaux on 03/03/25 at 02:43 PM