All-too-common fructose — present in table sugar and high fructose corn syrup, used widely in on a regular basis foods like ketchup — has long been considered a significant reason why Americans pack on the kilos.
Now, scientists say they’re closer to determining exactly what makes the suspect sweetener such a sticky business for those struggling to remain fit.
Researchers on the University of Colorado are floating a theory that fructose lowers and blocks the body’s adenosine triphosphate (ATP), a compound that naturally provides energy for cells.
One in every of the outcomes of that reduction is a decreased metabolism, which is required to burn off energy from food that has been consumed.
That shift — essentially initiated by fructose — can then result in weight gain.
“Fructose is what triggers our metabolism to enter low power mode,” explained Dr. Richard Johnson, a researcher on the Anschutz Medical Campus in Aurora, Colo., explained in a news release.
“Fructose is exclusive in resetting ATP levels to a lower level within the cell,” in line with the study, published within the journal “Obesity,” which noted that the sugar can be known for “suppressing” mitochondria, which generate energy to power cells.
In turn, the body deals with subsequent hunger by triggering cravings for less-than-healthy energy sources, including carbs and fatty foods that may ultimately be stored as fat that the body wouldn’t burn up.
“The low intracellular ATP levels end in carbohydrate-dependent hunger” — or carb-craving — ” … and metabolic effects that end in the increased intake of energy-dense fats,” in line with the research.
Thus begins a cycle of consuming more food that gets stored as fat, and our bodies then “lose our control of appetite, but fatty foods develop into the key source of calories that drive weight gain,” in line with Johnson.
“Obesity is a disorder of energy metabolism, by which there’s low usable energy (ATP) within the setting of elevated total energy,” in line with the study, concluding that “excess energy drives weight gain.”
Previous research from the University of Colorado School of Medicine also identified fructose as a sugar tied to unhealthy weight issues, noting that key characteristics of the negative process are “hunger, thirst, foraging, weight gain, fat accumulation, insulin resistance, systemic inflammation and increased blood pressure.”
In accordance with Johnson, who worked on each projects, the research offers a “full argument for the way a selected carbohydrate, fructose, might need a central role in driving obesity and diabetes.”
He also found that sugar causes sluggish, hibernation-like behavior in humans — something well-documented in bears and other animals.
“We are able to trace it back to our ancestors, in addition to learn from hibernating animals, exactly how fructose causes this ‘switch’ inside us.”
