Can Eating a High-Protein Diet Increase Your Metabolism?

by K. Aleisha Fetters December 5, 2014

by K. Aleisha Fetters December 5, 2014 Last Updated : June 10th, 2018

Load up on protein, and you’ll lose weight—right? Unfortunately, it may not be that simple:

Eating more protein might not necessarily influence the number on the scale, but it will go a long way toward ensuring the weight you do carry is muscle, not fat, according to a new study presented last week at the Obesity Society Annual Meeting in Boston.To determine how protein intake influences metabolism, researchers with the Pennington Biomedical Research Center put 16 healthy adults on high-calorie diets that were composed of different amounts of protein (five percent, 15 percent, and 25 percent) for eight weeks. All of the participants ate 40 percent more calories than they needed to maintain their weight, and all gained similar amounts of weight.

But—get ready for a huge silver lining—those who noshed on normal- and high- protein diets (15 and 25 percent, respectively) stored 45 percent of the excess calories as muscle, while those on the low-protein diet (five percent) stored 95 percent of the excess calories as fat.

It’s unclear exactly how protein changes the way the body stores calories, but this study suggests that protein may have a huge impact on your body-fat percentage. And since increasing muscle mass can boost metabolism, it stands to reason that eating more protein may help rev up yours.

Read on at WomensHealthMag.com

Can Eating a High-Protein Diet Increase Your Metabolism?

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