Spot reduction by diet?

[Titan]

OK, now have a smarter question, inspired by the "Trim my fat ass" thread.

We all repeat that you can't spot reduce fat with exercise, and that no amount of crunches will give you a six pack. And I see no reason to disagree. However, we also say abs are made in the kitchen, and I'm wondering how much we can explore that idea.

So can we spot reduce by diet?

Also, I watched the lecture on fad diets yesterday, where she talked about how certain foods cause more belly fat to be stored. I should have taken notes, that's near the end. For example, drinking beer causes you to get the beer gut, as your body preferentially stores it there. To me this is fascinating.

I'm not sure if I can synthesize a cogent technical question here, but I've heard a lot of things from different places - the blessing and curse of having such an open mind.

I guess we have a kind of fat that we need on our organs called "brown fat" that actually can be useful for breaking up fat deposits if it is healthy. Encouraging brown fat metabolism has its benefits?

One supplement I take is Conjugated Lineolic Acid, or CLA. CLA is found in grass and since people don't eat grass, we normally find it in grass-fed beef. Supposedly this fatty acid has a way of helping the cow burn fat and add muscle. I don't understand the science here and it probably isn't well tested. But I have heard claims that CLA helps reduce belly fat and when I take it on my clean diet, my belly isn't horrible, but it never has been. I take 1g of CLA before each meal (since it can cramp your stomach sometime), 3 times a day.

So my hypothesis, is eating the least amount of crap (like alcohol) can prevent beer guts, can eating certain things accelerate loss of the beer gut or the fat ass?

Also, I know people will say just don't eat crap, but I would like to dig deeper here as to what crap is. The food list in the fat loss sticky is really good. But I'm wondering if we can focus on some things that really stand out on this point.

 

[SociallyChallenged]

It is usually understood that you can't spot reduce by any means other than liposuction. I don't actually believe beer is preferentially stored as belly fat. Beer is composed of alcohol and simple carbohydrates. Alcohol is usually converted into Acetyl-CoA, which can't be stored and must be used as energy. The carbohydrates from the beer (or any other present food) is the part that is stored as fat. On men, fat is most likely to be stored on the trunk (back and belly), while in women it's likely to be stored in the hips, butt, and thighs. If you know women who are fat and drink copious amounts of beer - they don't typically have a beer gut. Rather, they are fat everywhere, especially on their butt and thighs.

Brown fat, in the human body, is very sparse. Its effects are easiest to observe in infants, but brown fat's effects are not viewable on the macro scale in adults. Anything that helps mobilize fat does not necessarily remove that fat. Only if an individual is in a caloric deficit will the fat be used, never to be seen again. Keep in mind that almost everything, including CLA, is absorbed in the small intestine. Why would something absorbed in the small intestine act at the belly? If it acts on fat stores, it acts on fat stores everywhere, not just belly-fat stores. Also, CLA is another fatty acid. Your body will absorb it and store it if in a caloric surplus and burn it for energy if in a caloric deficit.

Therefore, eating too much is always the source of beer guts. If you drank all the beer you wanted, but were still under or at caloric maintenance, you wouldn't get a beer gut. You would gain no mass.

 

[uclaLabrat]

It is usually understood that you can't spot reduce by any means other than liposuction. I don't actually believe beer is preferentially stored as belly fat. Beer is composed of alcohol and simple carbohydrates. Alcohol is usually converted into Acetyl-CoA, which can't be stored and must be used as energy. The carbohydrates from the beer (or any other present food) is the part that is stored as fat. On men, fat is most likely to be stored on the trunk (back and belly), while in women it's likely to be stored in the hips, butt, and thighs. If you know women who are fat and drink copious amounts of beer - they don't typically have a beer gut. Rather, they are fat everywhere, especially on their butt and thighs.

Brown fat, in the human body, is very sparse. Its effects are easiest to observe in infants, but brown fat's effects are not viewable on the macro scale in adults. Anything that helps mobilize fat does not necessarily remove that fat. Only if an individual is in a caloric deficit will the fat be used, never to be seen again. Keep in mind that almost everything, including CLA, is absorbed in the small intestine. Why would something absorbed in the small intestine act at the belly? If it acts on fat stores, it acts on fat stores everywhere, not just belly-fat stores. Also, CLA is another fatty acid. Your body will absorb it and store it if in a caloric surplus and burn it for energy if in a caloric deficit.

Therefore, eating too much is always the source of beer guts. If you drank all the beer you wanted, but were still under or at caloric maintenance, you wouldn't get a beer gut. You would gain no mass.

Disagree about the acetyl co-A not being stored....it's the basis for fatty acid synthesis.
I don't know how much of the oxidized ethanol (to acetaldehyde) is converted to acetate and then acetyl co-A but I presume it's a lot.

 

[SociallyChallenged]

Disagree about the acetyl co-A not being stored....it's the basis for fatty acid synthesis.
I don't know how much of the oxidized ethanol (to acetaldehyde) is converted to acetate and then acetyl co-A but I presume it's a lot.

Acetyl-CoA cannot be stored. There must be at least three carbons in a substance for it to be stored. In the Kreb's cycle, two carbons come in (as Acetyl-CoA), two carbons go out (as CO2). You must have excess carbons for the compound to form glucose molecules. Glucose molecules can then be used for glycogenesis or converted to fatty acids. We actually went over this in last year's biochem class in specifics. I'll get my notebook back from my girlfriend and elaborate.

 

[uclaLabrat]

here ya go:
http://www.rpi.edu/dept/bcbp/molbiochem/MBWeb/mb2/part1/fasynthesis.htm

 

[SociallyChallenged]

here ya go:
http://www.rpi.edu/dept/bcbp/molbiochem/MBWeb/mb2/part1/fasynthesis.htm

Lol, it seems I botched my explanation. Lemme see what I meant. It had something to do with the Kreb Cycle. You are correct.

 

[uclaLabrat]

Lol, it seems I botched my explanation. Lemme see what I meant. It had something to do with the Kreb Cycle. You are correct.

In principle you are correct, acetyl co-A is converted to malonyl co-A before any condensation reactions are carried out. Semantics really.

 

[Kipper]

Beer has barely any carbs in it. The calories are coming from the alcohol, not the carbohydrates in beer (whatever food you happen to be eating at the same time doesn't help at all). Acetyl-CoA should be dumped into the citric acid cycle, under normal circumstances, but the problem is that glycolysis is essentially shut down while the liver starts neutralizing the alcohol.

Metabolism of ethanol causes a dramatic rise in the concentration of NADH relative to NAD, which, if I recall correctly, is one of the ways enzymes involved in glycolysis are regulated. NADH is vital for fatty acid synthesis, and guess what? You now have an ass-load of NADH floating around - it's got to go somewhere, and the enzymes involved in fatty acid synthesis rev up. No surprise, then, that consumption of alcohol generally results in elevated blood triglycerides - higher triglycerides means more fat is pulled out of the blood by the peripheral (muscle and fat) cells; unsurprisingly, fat gain.

If you've ever heard of fatty liver syndrome, this is a disease where the liver basically becomes choked with pockets of deposited fat because there is so much floating around. Generally associated with alcoholism although there are other causes where triglyceride synthesis is ridiculously elevated. Unsurprisingly, if you eat a high-fat diet and drink a ton of alcohol, you generally get worse cases of fatty liver.

 

[SociallyChallenged]

In principle you are correct, acetyl co-A is converted to malonyl co-A before any condensation reactions are carried out. Semantics really.

Yeah, but I was off. I confused myself with gluconeogenesis a bit. You are correct though that Acetyl-CoA is the general source of carbons to synthesize fatty acids. Thanks for the correction.