Exercise mimetic

An exercise mimetic is a drug that mimics some of the biological effects of physical exercise. Exercise is known to have an effect in preventing, treating, or ameliorating the effects of a variety of serious illnesses, including cancer, type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and psychiatric and neurological diseases such as Alzheimer's disease. As of 2021, no drug is known to have the same benefits.^[2][3][1]

Various exercise mimetics and their effects on pathways also affected by exercise^[1]

Known biological targets affected by exercise have also been targets of drug discovery, with limited results. These known targets include:^[2]

Targets	Drug candidates
irisin[2]
brain-derived neurotrophic factor[2]
interleukin-6[2]
peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor delta	GW501516[2]
PPAR gamma coactivator 1-alpha[4]
estrogen-related receptor γ/α	GSK4716[2] SLU-PP-332
NFE2L2[4]
Canonical transient receptor potential (TRPC) proteins[5]
Myostatin	myostatin inhibitors[6]

The majority of the effect of exercise in reducing cardiovascular and all-cause mortality cannot be explained via improvements in quantifiable risk factors, such as blood cholesterol. This further increases the challenge of developing an effective exercise mimetic.^[1] Moreover, even if a broad spectrum exercise mimetic were invented, it is not necessarily the case that its public health effects would be superior to interventions to increase exercise in the population.^[1]