Study 1: www.nature.com/articles/s42...

Study 2: ajcn.nutrition.org/article/S000...

For more info, I review both studies here: josephmatthewsphd.substack.com/p/monthly-ro...

👉🏽 Optimizing glycemic variability in type 2 diabetes using simple dietary and culinary recommendations to modulate starch digestibility

🔘 17% reduction in mean glycaemic amplitude excursions (MAGE)
🔘 Improved glucose stability (measured via CONGA) across 1, 2, 4, and 8-hour periods

Yes @chriskirkasp.bsky.social - point me in the direction of some great people!

Hey - I’m a physiologist and nutritionist working in the U.S. Our lab studies protein metabolism using stable isotopes.

scholar.google.com/citations?us...

We cover:
🔘 Protein quality metrics
🔘EAA composition
🔘 Processing and cooking effects
🔘 EAA bioavailability
🔘 Protein synthesis and turnover
🔘 Special considerations for aging
🔘 Protein quality in whole diets
🔘 EAA density
🔘 Beyond current metrics

❓ It is possible that BA may be beneficial in more severe metabolic conditions (although other nutrition interventions will likely be more beneficial).

🏋🏽‍♂️ Keep supplementing BA for exercise performance!

What does this mean?

🤔 There is *some* mechanistic evidence that carnosine can improve metabolic health by increasing glucose uptake and reducing insulin resistance. But human clinical trials do not currently provide high-quality evidence to support this.

🫀 We reassessed biomarkers of cardiometabolic health and cardiovascular function. However, for the dose and duration studied, there was no *clear* benefit for adults with overweight or obesity.

Paper 🔗 t.co/rT5Mj6bIXM

💊 Finally, we performed a well-controlled human clinical trial in 30 people with overweight or obesity (two-thirds had prediabetes). For 3-months, people received either 6.4 grams per day of BA or a matched placebo, then...

🧫 Next, we investigated possible mechanisms using isolated muscle cells from healthy and T2D donors. Treating the T2D muscle cells with carnosine improved their glucose uptake - important for T2D and metabolic health.

Paper 🔗 t.co/LMPEXscC4Q

📊 Analyzing data from 172 people and 291 rodents showed that supplementation reduced fasting glucose and HbA1c - although the overall quality of the evidence was poor.

Analysis 🔗 t.co/YMXF0Es3Ey

❓ Because of this, it is possible that carnosine can help with metabolic health, particularly obesity and type-2 diabetes (T2D).

📈 To assess this, we performed a meta-analysis of all human and rodent data to see if supplementing with carnosine or BA improved glycaemic control.

But carnosine also:
🔘 Shuttles calcium ions (as a H-Ca exchanger)
🔘 Binds reactive species (as a detoxyfing agent)

Review 🔗 t.co/OJQ6QHpxHD

🏃🏽 Many athletes and nutritionists know that supplementing with beta-alanine increases carnosine concentrations in muscle. This improves the muscle's pH buffering capacity and subsequent short-duration, high-intensity performance (maximal efforts ~30s-5mins).

That's a wrap! Comment with any 2024 protein papers that I've missed 📚