Researchers from The Salk Institute in the US have gone on to prove something very interesting about diet and weight loss.
Eating meals within a 12 hour period and fasting for the rest of the day can have significant impact on your weight. In other words, eating between 8am to 8pm and then avoiding meals the rest of the day can make a difference to whether fat is stored or burnt up by the body.
The research has gone on to prove that late night meals have a huge impact on weight gain.
The researchers studied 400 mice, ranging from normal to obese, that were placed on various diets and time restrictions. They found that the mice that fed a high-fat diet, but allowed access to food for only 12 hours a day, were healthier and slimmer than the mice given access to the same food for the whole day, even though the two groups consumed the same number of calories.
The results were the same even if the diets were high in fat, high in sugar or high in fruit sugars.
The study also suggests that a late-night weekend takeaway, for example, is unlikely to harm the body’s metabolism. However, regularly eating at night would have a big impact.
“The fact that it worked no matter what the diet, and the fact that it worked over the weekend and weekdays, was a very nice surprise,” said the study’s first author, Amandine Chaix.
Much emphasis has been placed on what you eat but it isn’t only about what you eat, how you eat it and when you eat also plays a significant role. This study suggests restricting eating hours could help fight high cholesterol, diabetes and obesity.
S.O.Z