The fat that accumulates around the stomach adapts over time and becomes increasingly resistant to weight loss strategies such as fasting.
- Visceral and subcutaneous fat tend to increase their ability to store energy as new fat and therefore quickly replenish a “reserve” before a new period of fasting
- Visceral fat is able to adapt to repeated periods of fasting and protect its energy store
Belly fat is tough. Sport, diet, fasting… for some, nothing helps, belly fat resists. Australian researchers from the University of Sydney suggest this is due to the adaptive capacity of fat that accumulates around the stomach becoming increasingly resistant to weight loss. The results were presented on March 2 in the journal Cell Reports.
Intermittent fasting, the opposite effect
Researchers studied how fat reacts during intermittent fasting practiced every other day. For this, they examined the types of adipose tissue taken from different parts of the body to follow and understand their evolution. They found changes for three types of fat: visceral fat, fatty tissue that surrounds our organs including the stomach, and subcutaneous fat. “All fatty tissues are not the same and in fact their location makes a big difference.”, noted Dr. Mark Larance who is the lead author of the study. In total, more than 8,500 proteins located in fatty deposits were analyzed using a technique called proteomics. It makes it possible to monitor the reaction of proteins under certain conditions, in this case intermittent fasting.
During fasting, fatty tissue provides energy to the rest of the body by releasing fatty acid molecules. The results showed that over time, visceral fat becomes resistant to this release of fatty acids during fasting. Additionally, intermittent fasting appears to have the opposite effect than expected and visceral and subcutaneous fat tend to increase their ability to store energy as new fat and therefore quickly replenish a “reserve” before the next fasting period.
Visceral fat adapts
These observations suggest that visceral fat is able to adapt to repeated periods of fasting and protect its energy store. This adaptability may be why visceral fat resists weight loss after long periods of dieting or intermittent fasting. If these results were obtained on the adipose tissues of mice, the researchers consider them close to those of humans. “Mouse physiology is similar to humans, but their metabolism is much faster, allowing us to observe changes faster than with clinical trials and to examine hard-to-sample tissues in humans.”, they wrote.
The authors concluded by wanting to be reassuring for those looking to lose weight: the results of their work may not apply to other types of intermittent diets like the 5:2 diet – which involves two days of non-fasting. consecutive per week – or calorie restriction. “Future studies should focus on the molecules responsible for visceral fat resistance and may help determine which diets are most beneficial for metabolic health and abdominal fat loss.”, advanced the researchers.
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