The Atkins Nutritional Approach and the Metabolism

[Genecks]

I've been wondering something:

 

How does limiting the amount of carbohydrates in the human body change the metabolism, chemistry, and other physical processes of the human body? For what I understand, the body breaks down sugars and eventually turns them into ATP. However, I've been wondering, if the body doesn't have as much sugar, how does it create ATP?

 

If it doesn't use sugar to create ATP, doesn't it use fat or protein to create ATP? Are other biochemical structures activated in order to render fat or protein to be transformed into ATP? I'm trying to understand why the Atkin's nutritional approach, or "Atkin's Diet," works for some people. Why does it work? What makes it work?

 

Many studies in the past seems to have done trials, and they simply recorded weight loss over a brief period of time: about a year. But this is just a bunch of speculative research if you ask me. Some people have said the only thing lost was water weight. I find that hard to believe in a lot of ways, but I do know the human body is mostly composed of water.

 

Yet I can't dismiss the fact that many people claim to have lost weight. I don't seen how the fat tissue can remain around after a year, and the only thing lost was water.

 

I want to know the hardcore chemical and biological processes that occur during the diet: What about eating few carbs, moderate amounts of protein, and moderate amounts of fiber make a person lose weight? What biological processes occur, change, and/or stop?

 

I'm thinking if we could compare these processes to other forms of diet, we could understand more about the human metabolism and weight loss. However, I haven't seen any studies done on biological processes that pertain to Atkin's and metabolism.

 

My hypothesis is that if sugar doesn't remain constant or increase in the body, then the body uses fat or protein to make ATP and conduct metabolic processes. Thus, the burning or transforming of fat to create ATP occurs. Therefore, weight loss occurs. The body is compensating for a loss of sugar, and it is using fat in replacement.

 

The body is maintaining equilibrium, but it seems nobody has found the answer as to why this is happening. The theories I've seen so far is that researchs believe people are losing "water weight."

 

I'm thinking that's false. Also, they don't offer enough evidence to support their claim. Besides that, the body still has to use something instead of sugar for metabolic processes.

[Genecks]

Hmm..

 

I might have answered my own question a little bit. I decided to do some research on EBSCO. I found some information in a journal:

 

Bryngelsson, Susanne, and Nils-Georg Asp. "Popular diets, body weight and health: What is scientifically documented?." Scandinavian Journal of Nutrition 49.1 (2005): 15-20. Academic Search Premier. 25 November 2006. http://search.ebscohost.com.

 

I believe part of my hypothesis was correct. Although I forgot to add the whole, Acetyl-CoA part of the Kreb's cycle, I believe this article pretty much touched on the biological parts of the "Atkin's Diet."

 

During fasting, or diets low in carbohydrates, three main mechanisms contribute to maintain a constant blood glucose level: (i) the release of blood glucose from liver glycogen, (ii) the indirect use of muscle glycogen (transport as alanin and lactate to the liver) and (iii) gluconeogenesis (synthesis of glucose from proteins). Primarily, liver glycogen is used, but this reserve normally lasts for less than 24 h. Proteins for gluconeogenesis may be provided by the food or taken from the muscle tissue.

 

Loss of glycogen and water is a generally accepted explanation of the rapid initial weight loss due to energy restriction, especially when the intake of carbohydrates is low. The efficacy of low-carb diets may also be explained by the high satiating power of proteins, contributing to a reduced energy intake. Suppressed hunger, resulting from ketosis induced by fasting or starvation, as well as limitation of allowed food items, may also contribute. There is no evidence that low-carb diets lead to weight loss without reducing the caloric intake.

 

Perhaps I'm not clear on the above and below section, but I still don't understand what is happening to the adipose. What part of the biological system is removing fat? How is it removing fat?

 

Ketosis: a result of carbohydrate deficiency... When the glucose supply becomes low (e.g. between meals), all cells, except for nerve cells and blood cells, are able to use fatty acids as a source of energy. Fatty acids are initially transformed to acetylcoenzyme A (acetyl-CoA). Acetyl-CoA enters the citric acid cycle by binding to oxaloacetate, which is made from carbohydrates. A pronounced shortage of carbohydrates reduces the capacity to metabolize acetyl-CoA, owing to a lack of oxaloacetate. To reduce the accumulated excess of acetyl-CoA, two molecules are combined to form acetoacetate, later transformed to hydroxybutyrate and acetone. Together these three compounds are referred to as ketone bodies. Elevated levels of ketone bodies lead to ketosis, caused by starvation, a severe lack of dietary carbohydrates or uncontrolled diabetes. Under these conditions, ketone bodies become a major source of energy, gradually also for the brain, and the need for gluconeogenesis is thereby minimized

(muscle proteins are spared).

 

For the amount of reseach I've done, I've found that ketogenic diets are very similar to the Atkin's diet. Therefore, this bit of information might be of interest to any of you:

 

The provision of large amounts of fat, while at the same time significantly restricting carbohydrates, causes multiple biochemical alterations, most notably an increase in serum and urine ketone bodies (acetoacetate and p-hydroxybutyrate).

 

Work Cited:

Kossoff, Eric H. "Use of a Modified Atkins Diet for Epilepsy." Current Medical Literature: Epilepsy Monitor 9.3 (2005): 33-37. Academic Search Premier. 25 November 2006. http://search.ebscohost.com.