From: mazur@inmet.camb.inmet.com (Beth Mazur)
Subject: Katahn and carbohydrates -- the references
Organization: Intermetrics Inc, Cambridge MA
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 1992 19:03:39 GMT

Here are some of the passages and references from Katahn's T-Factor
Diet book.  For more info, please see your local WaldenBooks (it's
only a $5 book).

I suspect that overweight and unfit people have a much easier time 
converting excess carbos to fat than do the subjects in the studies
listed below.  My point in bringing this reference up was to dispute
a claim that simple sugars are somehow converted to fat "faster" than
complex carbos.  

However, as that poster may point out quickly, the quotes listed
below say nothing about simple or complex carbos.  I am possibly
making an invalid "leap of faith" to assume that these studies 
prove anything.  But here they are...

From Appendix A:

	...In one of the earlier studies on this latter issue, Acheson,
	Flatt, and Jequier (1982) fed a group of six men a meal containing
	500 grams (2000 calories) of carbohydrate.  During the next
	ten hours they found that only 9 grams of fat (81 calories)
	were produced from the carbohydrate in this meal, and that
	their subjects when into negative fat balance.  That is, the
	fuel mixture being burned during those ten hours required more
	fat than could be converted from the carbohydrate in the meal,
	and this fat had to be withdrawn from tissue storage of fat.

	...In another study, Acheson et al (1984) tested the impact
	of a 2000-calorie carbohydrate load on subjects who had bee
	acclimated to three different diets: a high fat, standard
	mixed, and high-carbo diet. ... [They] found that the higher
	the carbohydrate content of the customary diet, the greater
	the thermic effect of the signle meal, which illustrates the
	greater thermogenic potential of high-carbo compared with
	high-fat diets.

	...It is possible to force the body to convert a portion of
	dietary carbohydrate to fat following sustained large excesses
	of carbohydrate in the diet.  However, before such conversion
	takes place it is necessary to maximize the body's ability
	to store glycogen.  In a recent study, Acheson et al (1988)
	used a combination of exercise and diet first to deplete
	glycogen stores and then to saturate them on a high-carbo
	diet.  Each day, in order to saturate glycogen stores, they 
	fed their subjects 1500 more calories than they had burned on
	they previous day.  Before an appreciable conversion of 
	carbo to fat took place, there was a massive increase in glycogen
	storage until considerably higher than normal levels were
	reached (an average of 810 grams of glycogen storage versus
	the more usual average of about 500 grams).  In addition, there
	was a 35 percent increase in the metabolic rate so that by
	Day 7 of overfeeding in the experiment (the last day of
	overfeeding), the subjects were consuming over 5000 calories
	a day, approximately 4000 of which were in the form of
	carbohydrate.  This represented a diet-induced increase in
	energy requirements (adaptive thermogenesis) of about 1400
	calories per day ... in order to maintain that surplus of
	1500 calories above the previous day's energy needs.  
	...Acheson and his colleagues concluded that while it is possible
	to force the conversion of carbohydrate to fat, to do so glycogen
	stores must first increase by about 500 g over their normal
	level.  That is, the body can handle periodic loads of 2000
	calories of carbohydrate without contributing to fat synthesis
	and storage.  In order to continue appreciable conversion of
	carbos to fat, continued massive amounts of carbos over
	and above daily energy needs, such as they used in their study,
	would have to be ingested.

	Acheson, K.J., Flatt, J.P., and Jequier, E. (1982). Glycogen 
	   synthesis versus lipogenesis after a 500g carbo meal in man.
	   _Metabolism_, 31, 1234-1240.
	Acheson, Schutz, Y., Bessard, T. Anantharaman, K., Flatt, J.P.
	   and Jequier, E. (1984).  Glycogen storage capacity and de novo
	   lipogenesis during massive carbohydrate overfeeding in
	   man. _American Journal of Clinical Nutrition_, 48, 240-247.
	Acheson, Schutz, Y., Bessard, Ravussin, E., K., Flatt, J.P.
	   and Jequier, E. (1984).  Nutritional influences on lipogenesis
	   and thermogenesis after a carbohydrate meal. _American Journal
	   of Physiology_, 246, E62-70.
	
There are ten other references listed in the appendix by other authors
that are also discussed.

Beth Mazur                   "...life is more than a vision.  The sweetest
mazur@inmet.inmet.com         part is acting after making a decision."
...!uunet!inmet!mazur                                  -- The Indigo Girls