AURORA, Colo. — For years, vitamin consultants have grappled with the complicated puzzle of weight problems, with debates centered across the major perpetrator: extreme calorie consumption, particular meals like carbohydrates or fat, or maybe the position of sugar. Researchers from the College of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus have proposed a unifying concept that brings these seemingly conflicting concepts collectively below one widespread driver: fructose.
In line with Dr. Richard Johnson, a researcher on the College of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, and his colleagues, fructose, present in table sugar and high fructose corn syrup, is on the coronary heart of the weight problems drawback. Fructose can be produced within the physique from carbohydrates, notably glucose. When the physique metabolizes fructose, it reduces energetic power, generally known as ATP (adenosine triphosphate), which subsequently triggers starvation and elevated meals consumption.
This idea, which researchers name the “fructose survival speculation,” integrates numerous dietary theories associated to weight problems, together with two which have been at odds with one another: the power steadiness concept, which posits that excessive food intake, notably fat, drives weight problems, and the carbohydrate-insulin mannequin, which emphasizes carbohydrates’ position in weight achieve.
These theories, which beforehand appeared incompatible, will be considered as items of a bigger puzzle united by one essential element: fructose.
“Basically, these theories, which put a litany of metabolic and dietary drivers on the middle of the weight problems epidemic, are all items of a puzzle unified by one final piece: fructose,” says Dr. Johnson in a university release. “Fructose is what triggers our metabolism to enter low energy mode and lose our management of urge for food, however fatty meals develop into the main supply of energy that drive weight gain.”
As an example this unifying concept, researchers level to hibernating animals. When people are hungry and operating low on energetic power, our our bodies enter survival mode, very similar to animals getting ready for winter by foraging for meals. Fruits, recognized for being excessive in fructose, can considerably diminish energetic power. In the meantime, fats serves as saved power. Nonetheless, consuming high-fructose meals hinders the replenishment of energetic power from fats storage, leaving energetic power at a low degree, akin to a bear preparing for a prolonged winter hibernation.
“This concept views weight problems as a low-energy state,” notes Dr. Johnson. “Figuring out fructose because the conduit that redirects energetic power substitute to fats storage reveals that fructose is what drives power imbalance, which unites theories.”
The research is printed within the journal Obesity.
You may additionally be concerned about:
