Limiting Fructose May Boost Weight Loss, Researcher Reports

ScienceDaily (July 24, 2008) — One of the reasons people on low-carbohydrate diets may lose weight is that they reduce their intake of fructose, a type of sugar that can be made into body fat quickly, according to a researcher at UT Southwestern Medical Center.

Dr. Elizabeth Parks, associate professor of clinical nutrition and lead author of a study appearing in a current issue of the Journal of Nutrition, said her team's findings suggest that the right type of carbohydrates a person eats may be just as important in weight control as the number of calories a person eats.

Current health guidelines suggest that limiting processed carbohydrates, many of which contain high-fructose corn syrup, may help prevent weight gain, and the new data on fructose clearly support this recommendation.

"Our study shows for the first time the surprising speed with which humans make body fat from fructose," Dr. Parks said. Fructose, glucose and sucrose, which is a mixture of fructose and glucose, are all forms of sugar but are metabolized differently.

"All three can be made into triglycerides, a form of body fat; however, once you start the process of fat synthesis from fructose, it's hard to slow it down," she said.

In humans, triglycerides are predominantly formed in the liver, which acts like a traffic cop to coordinate the use of dietary sugars. It is the liver's job, when it encounters glucose, to decide whether the body needs to store the glucose as glycogen, burn it for energy or turn the glucose into triglycerides. When there's a lot of glucose to process, it is put aside to process later.

Fructose, on the other hand, enters this metabolic pathway downstream, bypassing the traffic cop and flooding the metabolic pathway.

"It's basically sneaking into the rock concert through the fence," Dr. Parks said. "It's a less-controlled movement of fructose through these pathways that causes it to contribute to greater triglyceride synthesis. The bottom line of this study is that fructose very quickly gets made into fat in the body."

Though fructose, a monosaccharide, or simple sugar, is naturally found in high levels in fruit, it is also added to many processed foods. Fructose is perhaps best known for its presence in the sweetener called high-fructose corn syrup or HFCS, which is typically 55 percent fructose and 45 percent glucose, similar to the mix that can be found in fruits. It has become the preferred sweetener for many food manufacturers because it is generally cheaper, sweeter and easier to blend into beverages than table sugar.

For the study, six healthy individuals performed three different tests in which they had to consume a fruit drink formulation. In one test, the breakfast drink was 100 percent glucose, similar to the liquid doctors give patients to test for diabetes -- the oral glucose tolerance test. In the second test, they drank half glucose and half fructose, and in the third, they drank 25 percent glucose and 75 percent fructose. The tests were random and blinded, and the subjects ate a regular lunch about four hours later.

The researchers found that lipogenesis, the process by which sugars are turned into body fat, increased significantly when as little as half the glucose was replaced with fructose. Fructose given at breakfast also changed the way the body handled the food eaten at lunch. After fructose consumption, the liver increased the storage of lunch fats that might have been used for other purposes.

"The message from this study is powerful because body fat synthesis was measured immediately after the sweet drinks were consumed," Dr. Parks said. "The carbohydrates came into the body as sugars, the liver took the molecules apart like tinker toys, and put them back together to build fats. All this happened within four hours after the fructose drink. As a result, when the next meal was eaten, the lunch fat was more likely to be stored than burned.

"This is an underestimate of the effect of fructose because these individuals consumed the drinks while fasting and because the subjects were healthy, lean and could presumably process the fructose pretty quickly. Fat synthesis from sugars may be worse in people who are overweight or obese because this process may be already revved up."

Dr. Parks said that people trying to lose weight shouldn't eliminate fruit from their diets but that limiting processed foods containing the sugar may help.

"There are lots of people out there who want to demonize fructose as the cause of the obesity epidemic," she said. "I think it may be a contributor, but it's not the only problem. Americans are eating too many calories for their activity level. We're overeating fat, we're overeating protein; and we're overeating all sugars."

Some data were collected at the University of Minnesota, where Dr. Parks worked before joining the UT Southwestern faculty in 2006.

The work was supported by the National Institutes of Health, the Cargill Higher Education Fund and the Sugar Association.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/release...80724064824.htm

Close but no cigar!

Da** you doctor why dint you see what happened to insuline when you drank fructose drink. How many times do u need to reinvent the wheel. sugar causes insuline to raise causes fat storage.

I haven't eliminated fruit from my diet. I still have a handful of blueberries once a week or so.

In other words-- don't drink soda pop.

Fructose can be especially troublsome; it doesn't cause the normal insulin response like other sugars and you can take in a lot and still feel hungry. It quickly replaces the glycogen stores depleted by LC or exercise, but if the stores are already full it becomes fat.

I had thought that fresh fruit was relatively low in fructose, but that it was called fructose because it was first discovered in fruit.

Fructose has a lower GI than other sugars. Diabetic "candy" used to be made with fructose before the days of Splenda. I can eat a low-GI fruit serving daily and have great blood glucose. I'm not trying to lose weight.

According to Taubes, an apple is approx 6% fructose, 4% sucrose, and 1% glucose. I thought that glucose went straight into the bloodstream and fructose went straight into the liver?




Interesting.



Sigh. Balloon popped, light bulb smashed.

Oh, I eat blueberries too, love them in fact.

I was really thinking that Dr. Parks was still towing the party line, which other statements confirm.

From The New York Times
24 July, 2008


Does Fructose Make You Fatter?

Tara Parker-Pope

High-fructose corn syrup is a sweetener used in many processed foods ranging from sodas to baked goods. While the ingredient is cheaper and sweeter than regular sugar, new research suggests that it can also make you fatter.

In a small study, Texas researchers showed that the body converts fructose to body fat with “surprising speed,'’ said Elizabeth Parks, associate professor of clinical nutrition at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas. The study, which appears in The Journal of Nutrition, shows how glucose and fructose, which are forms of sugar, are metabolized differently.
In humans, triglycerides, which are a type of fat in the blood, are mostly formed in the liver. Dr. Parks said the liver acts like “a traffic cop” who coordinates how the body uses dietary sugars. When the liver encounters glucose, it decides whether the body needs to store it, burn it for energy or turn it into triglycerides.

But when fructose enters the body, it bypasses the process and ends up being quickly converted to body fat.

“It’s basically sneaking into the rock concert through the fence,” Dr. Parks said. “It’s a less-controlled movement of fructose through these pathways that causes it to contribute to greater triglyceride synthesis. The bottom line of this study is that fructose very quickly gets made into fat in the body.”
For the study, six people were given three different drinks. In one test, the breakfast drink was 100 percent glucose. In the second test, they drank half glucose and half fructose; and in the third, they drank 25 percent glucose and 75 percent fructose. The drinks were given at random, and neither the study subjects nor the evaluators were aware who was drinking what. The subjects ate a regular lunch about four hours later.

The researchers found that lipogenesis, the process by which sugars are turned into body fat, increased significantly when the study subjects drank the drinks with fructose. When fructose was given at breakfast, the body was more likely to store the fats eaten at lunch.

Dr. Parks noted that the study likely underestimates the fat-building effect of fructose because the study subjects were lean and healthy. In overweight people, the effect may be amplified.

Although fruit contains fructose, it also contains many beneficial nutrients, so dieters shouldn’t eliminate fruit from their diets. But limiting processed foods containing high-fructose corn syrup as well as curbing calories is a good idea, Dr. Parks said.

“There are lots of people out there who want to demonize fructose as the cause of the obesity epidemic,” she said. “I think it may be a contributor, but it’s not the only problem. Americans are eating too many calories for their activity level. We’re overeating fat, we’re overeating protein and we’re overeating all sugars.”

And they replace fat with HFCS in "low fat" & "fat free stuff."

I used to choke down that crap, thinking it was good for me to avoid the fat. It was just making things worse.

Exaclty. I thought I was being healthy by eating low fat foods, eating lots of pineapple and other high sugar fruits. Sheeshh. No wonder I got to 280lbs.

Thats another chink in the armor affecting the "a calorie is a calorie" and "no bad foods" way of nutritional thinking. According to Taubes bad calories include: "Bread and other baked goods, potatoes, yams, rice, pasta, cereal grains, corn, sugar (sucrose and high fructose corn syrup), ice cream, candy, soft drinks, fruit juices, bananas and other tropical fruits..."

Coka Cola is low fat.

People need to realize that agave syrup is higher in fructose than corn syrup even. I know a lot of people get lured in by the "low glycemic" label but using this stuff is not helping your health or your diet.