Dr. William Rodman Shankle is best known for having single-handedly demolished a myth that the public and virtually all neuroscientists held for more than 50 years: that human beings are born with all the brain neurons they die with.

As reported by Sandra Blakeslee in The New York Times, "The most surprising finding [of the 1990s] about new cell growth in the human brain began more than two decades ago when a young doctor in training, William Rodman Shankle, re-examined data collected from 1939 to 1967 by Dr. Jesse L. Conel. Standing on the shoulders of such giants as Conel and Shankle's stepfather, the late Dr. Benjamin H. Landing (who discovered the structure of muscle, liver and kidney), encouraged Shankle to keep at it after five years of rejection by the scientific community. Shankle, using modern mathematical and computer techniques, found an astonishingly dynamic pattern: [that] the number of neurons rises by a third from birth to 3 months as new cells are added, and approximately doubles from 15 months to six years old." ("A Decade Of Discovery Yields a Shock About the Brain," January 4, 2000.)

Shankle's revolutionary discovery of human neurogenesis has now received extensive confirmation from such notable scientists as Elizabeth Gould and Fred H. Gage (former president of the Society for Neuroscience). Furthermore (and perhaps even more significantly), Shankle's analysis of data that lay fallow for 70 years ultimately spawned the era of stem cell research.

Shankle has lately specialized in publicizing new techniques to prevent or delay the onset of (and subsequent death from) Alzheimer's disease. Many consider his well-received book, Preventing Alzheimer's, written with Daniel G. Amen (who has published other New York Times bestsellers), and published in 2005 by Putnam - as well as the preventive assessment tools he makes available on his website (www.PreventAD.com) - indispensable for the prevention of Alzheimer's.

Now, having taken a new look at the brain's functions as they relate to weight management, Shankle and his colleagues are about to deconstruct the considerable mythology surrounding the subject of obesity. As president of Anchor-International Foundation, Shankle has brought his expertise in brain function, and particularly the function of the monoamine neurotransmitters (serotonin, norepinephrine, and dopamine), to solve, once and for all, the "fat epidemic" that tortures the nation.

(Shankle's international foundation, whose Chairman is HRH Princess Michael of Kent, was created in Russia by two Americans who worked as advisors to the City of St. Petersburg to raise funds for the first cardiology clinic in Russia to specialize in angioplasty.)

"As scientists," Shankle says, "we have been misusing a concept over two centuries old to approach the obesity problem - namely, that the brain and the body are two separate entities. Consequently, our weight loss advice has focused on treating the body instead of treating the whole being. For example, we treat exercise as if its only value were to balance 'energy in with energy out.' The fact is, exercise is such a potent "treatment," that any pharmaceutical company that could dispense it in pill form would become the richest on the planet!

"Exercise yields many benefits - for example, it can help prevent diabetes, improve blood flow to the brain, generate antioxidants to protect the cells of both our body and our brain; but most significantly, when it comes to weight management, exercise can stimulate the release of hunger-suppressing neurotransmitters, thereby making dieting relatively painless.

"Like the drug Meridia," he goes on, "which has to be taken every day to be effective, daily monoaminergic exercise raises serotonin levels both in the brain and the gut to such an extent that a person no longer experiences the sensation of hunger - but only if the exercise is every day."

A good example of this hunger suppressing effect comes from Anchor-International's clinical trials of the effects of exercise in obese persons. Those who exercise virtually every day eventually stop experiencing hunger pangs. In fact, after a period of months, daily exercisers report having difficulty recalling how it feels to be hungry! (They report no loss of healthy appetites, however, once they're seated at table!)

While some persons regularly exercise vigorously in order to "burn calories," most people have difficulty with that approach because it is uncomfortable, unpleasant, and time consuming. On the other hand, regular exercise for 30 minutes daily doesn't have to be uncomfortable (for example, if one regularly uses a high-quality recumbent exercise bicycle); nor does it have to take too much time. For most people, it also should be combined with headphone music that can inspire expressive "dance" movements to take the place of boring, mindless pedaling.

Such daily exercise (which need never vary and which need not include "warm-ups," stretching, or cosmetic strength training) is much more practical and affordable for most people. Even the cost of purchasing a first-class exercise bicycle is often cheaper than a single years' membership in a luxury health club!

Another advantage to a daily exercise program is that one doesn't have to buy special foods, formulas, or pills to achieve proper weight - lifelong. The only problem - and it's a big one! - is that there are no vested interests promoting monoaminergic exercise. After all, obesity products comprise a $36-billion a year industry. Why would any manufacturer tolerate eliminating its own market?

Dr. Shankle says, "I'm glad our foundation took the initiative to put the public's interest first in trying to increase awareness about this simple, virtually free, and effective solution to proper weight control.

"Where Anchor-International has made its real contribution, in my opinion, is in defining which kind of exercise works safely and most effectively; and how long and how often exercise needs to be practiced to achieve sustainable weight loss. The findings of our clinical trials show that patients who follow their own routines based on our hypotheses report no problems with hunger, boredom, or temptation to eat more. They encounter no "plateaus" (or "set-points"); and they can maintain their weight reductions lifelong.

"For the past seven years, Anchor-International Foundation has supported a clinical trial testing its hypotheses on persons ranging from 41 to 71 years old. All subjects have lost between 25 and 175 pounds within a predictable number of months; and all have maintained their new lower weight for at least five years."

"The key to Anchor's approach," says Shankle, "appears not to be in the calories burned by exercise, but the reduced hunger sensation due to exercise. For example, we measured the caloric intake of a subject during the final part of his weight loss program. Because of the subject's 30-minute-a-day exercise regimen, his appetite was reduced so that he was completely comfortable eliminating exactly 3,500 calories weekly from his weekly diet, which is exactly equivalent to one pound of weight loss per week. Over 11.5 weeks, therefore, he lost exactly 11.5 lbs, none of which was attributable to the calories burned by exercise."

(The subject wanted to lose only ten pounds; but - out of curiosity - he continued on the diet until his weight loss "score" matched exactly the number of weeks on his diet, at which point he stopped.)

Click here to see the results of the experiment.

Note that the subject's weight on March 5, 2007 [which is today - exactly one year after the experiment ended] is exactly 155.0 pounds.)

"Anchor's clinical trial has achieved predictable success among individuals who had tried all the popular diets that frequently end up as bestseller books in The New York Times," says Shankle. "The ability to keep the pounds off, probably for life, however, is - to our knowledge - a unique aspect of this program."

Shankle adds, "Our goal is to make the public aware of what Anchor-International has demonstrated (although on a small scale), and to expand the ability to test the approach across a much larger spectrum of people. As Anchor-International has no vested interest in proprietary products or programs with which to profit from the dissemination of this knowledge, we hope that community leaders will recognize the value of what our foundation is doing so that more people can benefit from the better health and greatly reduced disease risks now possible for society."

Anchor-International helps individuals access their own motivational system through an approach called "Acting Well," which integrates the motivational concepts developed for "Method Acting" by Konstantin Stanislavski.

These same concepts were used by the actor Roy Scheider to lose fifty pounds when he was an obese teenager. (He never regained the weight!) More recently, Scheider used Acting Well techniques to rid himself of a severe smoking addiction that had plagued him for decades. He characterizes the value of Anchor's approach in his preface to its book, Acting Well to Age Well, as well as in Anchor's half-hour video, called "The Magic Bullet."

Click here to watch the video.

Also interviewed in "The Magic Bullet" is another Anchor-International associate, Dr. Alexander Shaknovich, former chief of invasive cardiology at New York Hospital, who gives a cardiologist's thoughtful assessment of the value of Acting Well as a possible alternative (that is, a behavioral "magic bullet") to medications for the treatment of high cholesterol and high blood pressure.

The concept of doctors prescribing exercise is an important one to convey to both healthcare professionals and the public. The story of "The Magic Bullet" was also featured in the London Times.

Click here to read the London Times Story.

Besides its medical projects, Anchor-International Foundation produces cultural events connected especially to sustaining "The Virgil Fox Legacy" through CD and DVD recordings and concerts. Since 2006, for example, the foundation has presented an annual Summer Organ Series at Trinity Church Wall Street, bringing hundreds of thousands of web visitors to the church's website:

(http://www.TrinityWallStreet.org) to view the recitals free.

Click here to read a New York Times review of
Anchor-International's 2007 Trinity organ series.

In honor of the organ concert series (which many recognize as the most important in New York), the foundation has named its newly developed obesity remedy "The Organ Diet."

Trinity's organ isn't a pipe organ, and Anchor-International's Organ Diet isn't a dietician-designed restrictive eating regimen. Both are in classes by themselves: effective, innovative, brilliant, revolutionary, and often offering the best possible solutions to the problems they address.  Both are therefore destined to be controversial.

As part of its ongoing clinical trial, in 2008, the foundation will invite a limited number of new participants (probably one or two new members a month for the next year) to join its "Community" in order to receive free coaching and membership in its periodic support group meetings (based on the AA "sponsorship" model) at a Manhattan church (most likely Trinity Wall Street and/or Middle Collegiate Church).

Augmenting these meetings will be weekly song festivals as appropriate for all religions as they are for "non-believers."

The "Virtual Pipe Organ" company sponsoring the project will provide the musicians to accompany "The Community Choir," whose purpose will be to strengthen and reinforce each member's resolve to achieve and remain at his or her constantly rising personal health "peak" solely through self-empowerment.