Sending more calories to muscle, less to body fat

Active tissues in the body (everything other than body fat) can absorb about 10 Calories per minute. Eating pure sugar, such as in a candy bar or ice cream, results in calories entering the bloodsteam faster than the maximum rate that active tissues can absorbe those calories, meaning fat has to absorb much of what was consumed. On the other hand, eating a big dark green and colorful (red and orange vegetables on top) salad slows down the digestion of anything else you eat in the meal, meaning not only will you eat less due to the satiety that comes from the vegetable bulk in the stomach, but more of the calories you eat go to muscle and other active tissues since the fuel enters the bloodstream slower. This single principle (reducing body fat and increasing muscle fueling with vegetable intake) is the central theme of much of my work. Increased muscle fueling is called insulin sensitivity in the clinical community, which is the opposite of insulin resistance. When insulin resistance (more fat fueling, less muscle fueling) is bad enough to need the help of a physician (there are more technical definitions than this), it is called type II diabetes. When the beta cells in the pancreas start to fail (are attacked by one's own immune system during an episode of increased immune function, such as during a flu), the body goes from having too high a fasting basal insulin level to not producing enough insulin. This transition describes the process of becoming a type I diabetic. There are instances where the mechanisms I describe here do not apply i.e. when the cause is entirely genetic. The latter is relatively rare in the obesity and diabetes epidemic we are seeing in the United States. These national trends show us that as a nation, Americans are not fueling their muscles very well.