The potential harm caused to the blood circulation in your legs can be offset by easy -- even slow -- five-minute walks, says new research out of Indiana University.

Providing the first experimental evidence of the benefits that even brief walks can offer, findings from the study have already been published online, but are on track to be featured in an upcoming hard-copy issue of "Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise," the official journal of the American College of Sports Medicine, according to Saurabh Thosar, the postdoctoral researcher at Oregon Health & Science University who led the research as a doctoral candidate at IU's School of Public Health-Bloomington, in a university news release.

"There is plenty of epidemiological evidence linking sitting time to various chronic diseases and linking breaking sitting time to beneficial cardiovascular effects, but there is very little experimental evidence," Thosar said in a statement. "We have shown that prolonged sitting impairs endothelial function, which is an early marker of cardiovascular disease, and that breaking sitting time prevents the decline in that function."

Sitting for long periods of time -- like many people have to do daily at their jobs -- is linked with risk factors such as higher cholesterol levels and greater weight, which that can lead to cardiovascular and metabolic disease. When people sit, certain muscles do not contract to effectively pump blood to the heart and, as a result, blood can pool in the legs and affect the endothelial function of arteries -- or the ability of blood vessels to expand from increased blood flow.

The study involved 11 non-obese, healthy men between the ages of 20 and 35 who participated in two randomized trials. In one trial they sat for three hours without moving their legs. Researchers used a blood pressure cuff and ultrasound technology to measure the functionality of the femoral artery at baseline and again at the one-, two- and three-hour mark.

In the second trial, the men sat during a three-hour period but also walked on a treadmill for five minutes at a speed of 2 mph at the 30-minute mark, 1.5-hour mark and 2.5-hour mark. Researchers measured the functionality of the femoral artery at the same intervals as in the other trial.

The researchers were able to demonstrate that, during a three-hour period, the flow-mediated dilation -- in other words, or the expansion of the arteries as a result of increased blood flow of the main artery in the legs -- was impaired by as much as 50 percent after just one hour.

However, study participants who walked for five minutes for each hour of sitting saw their arterial function stay the same, which Thosar explained as a likely result of the increase in muscle activity and related blood flow.

"American adults sit for approximately eight hours a day," he said. "The impairment in endothelial function is significant after just one hour of sitting. It is interesting to see that light physical activity can help in preventing this impairment."