After reviewing a research paper on obesity it appears that there may be benefit in consuming a "low protein" diet at least for short term metabolic advantage. Perhaps even permanently improving certain imbalances. There are obviously some varitations in how effect certain person's metabolisms are in effectively promoting DIT(diet induced thermogenesis).
Perhaps these variations are contributed to nurtient quantity and limiting refined foods.
"Using diets providing
3% protein (low-protein, LP) and 15% protein
(termed high-protein, but actually normal-protein, NP)
to overfeed university students a daily excess of
4.2 MJ (1000 kcal) or more over periods of 3 ± 6
weeks, they reported that the efficiency of weight
gain was less than predicted if the excess calories
were laid down as body fat; this deviation from
predictions being particularly marked during LP-overfeeding.
In the absence of significant changes in digestibility, in body composition and in physical activity level, they attributed the bulk of the `missing
"Using diets providing
3% protein (low-protein, LP) and 15% protein
(termed high-protein, but actually normal-protein, NP)
to overfeed university students a daily excess of
4.2 MJ (1000 kcal) or more over periods of 3 ± 6
weeks, they reported that the efficiency of weight
gain was less than predicted if the excess calories
were laid down as body fat; this deviation from
predictions being particularly marked during LP-overfeeding.
In the absence of significant changes in digestibility, in body composition and in physical activity level, they attributed the bulk of the `missing
calories' (re¯ected in the low efficiency of weight
gain) to an increase in heat production, and the term
dietary-induced thermogenesis came into existence.
This was subsequently shortened slightly to dietinduced
thermogenesis and abbreviated as DIT by
"the majority of overfeeding
studies conducted during the past 3 decades have
failed to demonstrate a high cost (that is low ef®-
ciency) of weight gain in response to overconsumption
of diets typical of af¯uent societies, in which protein contributes 12 ± 16% of energy intake.Furthermore, in a closer inspection of the gluttony
studies conducted during the past 3 decades have
failed to demonstrate a high cost (that is low ef®-
ciency) of weight gain in response to overconsumption
of diets typical of af¯uent societies, in which protein contributes 12 ± 16% of energy intake.Furthermore, in a closer inspection of the gluttony
experiments of Miller et al,5,6 Stock shows that the
cost of weight gain on the NP diet (15% protein) was
more or less what would be predicted if there was no
change in energetic ef®ciency.11 By contrast, the cost
of weight gain in those volunteers overfed the LP diet
(3% protein) was well above the predicted values if
the gain in weight was entirely fat, and could only be
due to a large decrease in energetic ef®ciencyÐthat
is to the activation of DIT during overfeeding on the
LP diet."
The expirements showed that there was a much greater cost of weight gain for those eating the low protein diet. This means that there was a "wasting" of calories through diet induced thermogenesis.
"The extent to which low-protein diets could affect
energetic efficiency was not fully recognized until
Miller and Payne used two weanling pigs to compare
the effects of restricting protein intake on the
energy cost of weight maintenance with restricting
energy intake. In this rather bizarre experiment, one
pig was allowed to eat ad libitum a diet with a protein
concentration so low that however much it ate it could
only take in sufficient protein to meet its maintenance
requirement, which meant that growth was impossible.
By contrast, the high-protein pig was fed a
standard, high-protein weaning diet that would normally
produce rapid growth if fed ad libitum. However,
this pig's food intake was restricted such that the
animal could only just maintain weight i.e. growth
was limited by energy. As a result of this dietary
manipulation, the low-protein pig was found to
require almost 5-times more energy to maintain the
same body weight as the high-protein pig. It was not
possible to carry out a proper energy balance, but it is
quite obvious from the results shown in Table 4 that if
the low-protein pig had not converted most of the
extra energy it consumed to heat, it would have
deposited an amount of fat almost equivalent to its entire body weight
- that is as much fat as there was pig!"
But you may be asking yourself why this would be an advantage in our human history.
"...also result in
low efficiency of growth and increased thermogenesis,
16 the teleological argument can be put forward
that a high capacity to activate DIT has emerged
during the course of evolution as an adaptation to
nutrient-deficient diets. As argued by Stock, the
necessity to increase DIT in the face of nutrient
deficient diets probably had survival advantage
during the course of mammalian evolution since it
enables the overeating (on an energy basis) of such
nutrient-deficient diets in an attempt to achieve an
adequate intake of the specific nutrient, but without
the disadvantage of excessive fat accumulation and
hindrance to optimal locomotion, hunting capabilities,
and the ability to fight or flight. Viewed in terms of
survival value, it is therefore not surprising that
protein de®ciency is a most potent dietary stimulus
of thermogenesis, and Miller, who was very much
aware of this following earlier studies on protein :
energy requirements for maintenance, is therefore
selected a low-protein diet in order to test the ability
of humans to resist weight gain during overfeeding."
Overfeeding a Low-Protein diet could possibly be a tool to see where you stand metabolically, allowing an inside look at glandular homeostasis.
“the possibility arises
that overfeeding low-protein diets could serve as a
tool for maximising DIT to exaggerate individual
differences in energetic efficiency. In other words,
low-protein overfeeding may serve as a `magnifying
glass' for unravelling the genetic and metabolic basis
by which variations in thermogenesis contribute to
susceptibility to leanness and fatness during overconsumption
of the typical (well balanced) diets of
our afluent societies."
