PhD defence: The role of dietary protein content and exercise training in metabolic fitness

Zhencheng Li

PhD thesis

Previous studies have shown that a chronic low protein/high carbohydrate diet (LPHC) is beneficial, whereas a high protein/low carbohydrate diet (HPLC) is detrimental, to metabolic health and life-span. Periodization, i.e. switching between periods of normal and special diets, is a way to increase adherence but it is not known if the health-benefits of a LPHC diet would be retained on a periodized LPHC diet regimen. Furthermore, the interaction between a periodized LPHC diet regimen and exercise training is unknown. This is important to know since diet and exercise are commonly co-implemented to promote health.

This PhD project investigated mainly the efficacy of periodized LPHC diet, provided in 14 day on/off cycles, to promote metabolic health and its interaction with concurrent voluntary wheel running in mice. A secondary study investigated the effect of a chronic normal, high and low protein diet on skeletal muscle insulin action.

We found that a periodized LPHC diet regimen transiently conferred potent obesity-protective and insulin-sensitizing benefits, independent of skeletal muscle. Unexpectedly, concurrent exercise dampened some of these benefits, most notably the induction of a key mediator of LPHC actions, FGF21, in the liver. This suggests that a periodized LPHC diet regimen could be an effective health-promoting strategy but that its interaction with exercise warrants consideration.

2018, 78 pages.

Time

30 November 2018, 13:00

Place

Aud 1, August Krogh Building, Universitetsparken 13, 2100 Copenhagen

Opponents

Associate professor Nikolai Baastrup Nordsborg (chair), Department of Nutrition, Exercise and Sports, University of Copenhagen, Denmark.

Assistant professor Dudley Lamming, University of Wisconsin, USA.

Dr. med. Sten Lund, Department of Clinical Medicine, Aarhus University, Denmark.

Supervisor

Associate professor Thomas Elbenhardt Jensen, Department of Nutrition, Exercise and Sports, University of Copenhagen, Denmark.