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14.05.2017

Animal study: plant-based proteins with bad amino acid profile make you fatter

If healthy people go over to a diet based largely on plant proteins, and don't watch out for the amino acid profile of those proteins, then they put on weight. This is suggested in an animal study published in the Journal of Nutrition by the American nutritionist and fitness expert Layne Norton [biolayne.com], of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Study
Norton gave four groups of adult rats feed consisting of 16 percent protein, three times a day for 12 weeks. One group got protein from wheat [Wheat], another got soya protein [Soy], another protein from eggs [Egg], and the fourth group got whey [Whey].

Results
The most noticeable effect was that wheat protein stimulated the growth of the rats' fat mass. At the end of the experiment the rats in the wheat group had over 20 percent more fat than the rats in the other groups.

At the same time, the gastrocnemius - a calf muscle with mainly strong, big type-2 muscle fibres - was biggest in the whey group and smallest in the soy group.

After 2 and 12 weeks Norton measured how much muscle protein the rats' muscle fibres built up after a meal. Whey provided the strongest anabolic stimulus, wheat protein the weakest.

Norton bases his explanation for the different effects that the different types of protein have on body composition on their amino acid composition. Whey, the best performing protein, contains far more BCAAs, leucine, lysine, methionine and threonine than the other proteins. This differs most from the plant-based protein amino acid composition.

Conclusion
"The extrapolation of these findings in rats to humans requires caution," wrote Norton.

"We attempted to model human meal patterns that we observed in our long-term weight-management studies. We assume that the magnitude of the changes observed in rats is likely greater than in humans, but we have no reason to suspect that the direction of change differs."

"Although this study provides proof-of-concept, long-term benefits of meal distribution of dietary protein remain to be established in a human study."

Sponsor
Norton's study was sponsored by the American Egg Nutrition Center and the American Egg Board. So that's pretty much the whole egg sector.

Plant-based proteins
Norton's animal study is interesting for the rapidly growing group of strength athletes that are going over to plant-based proteins. Certainly bodybuilders who are going for a low fat percentage and high muscle bulk will achieve better results if they can keep the amino acid composition of the proteins they use as close to that of whey as possible.

The Dutch natural bodybuilder Jurgen Verweijen has designed just such a protein, which is marketed under the name of Silverback Protein. [silverbackprotein.nl] Silverback Protein is completely plant based. Its main ingredient is protein from peas, but the product contains the same amino acids as whey does.

Source:
J Nutr 2017;147:195-201.

More:
Soya protein + HMB has same anabolic effect as whey 23.08.2016
Pea protein: a fine way to build up muscle 22.03.2015
Rice protein works just as well as whey for bodybuilders 19.07.2013

Archives:
Plant Proteins
Weight Loss
Protein

Added leucine makes wheat protein as anabolic as whey A protein that athletes rightly turn their nose up at – because it doesn't provide the optimal amino acids for muscle building – becomes a lot more interesting if you add leucine to it.	Fat percentage too high? Add rice protein to your shake If you want to be leaner, then an excellent strategy is to make your diet more protein rich. This study suggests that a protein shake works even better if it is made partly or wholly from rice protein.	Strength training + soya protein shake help women slim faster Strength training is a great way to achieve a healthy weight, if you're prepared to take a long-term approach. You can strengthen that effect by including 25 g extra soya protein in your diet.