Breakfast-skipping as an intermittent fasting protocol
Creators: name: Zilberter, Tanya
Publisher: name: F1000Research
Year: 2017

description: The widely accepted notion of BF as the most important meal of the day has been called into question. Statistics recently showed that 25% of Americans now regularly skip breakfast (BF) in order to lose weight, despite aggressive campaigns labeling skipping BF as one of the most harmful eating behaviors. On the contrary, current recommendation regarding BF are now seen as perhaps the most peremptory yet metabolically groundless health guidelines. It is routinely stated that skipping BF is overcompensated with increased energy consumption later during the day, which is not been confirmed in direct controlled trials: skipping BF caused no overcompensation of calorie intake later in the day. On the contrary, daily energy and fat intakes were reduced with BF omission. Moreover, skipping BF resulted in a net energy deficit of about 400 kcal a day.<br><br>Calorie restriction has been shown to have profound anti-aging benefits. Furthermore, intermittent fasting had more metabolic benefits than permanent calorie restriction, thus skipping BF may be more beneficial than traditional restrictive dieting infamous for its low compliance due to increased appetite and hunger. Intermittent fasting including skipping BF is shown to have good adherence due to effortless creation of calorie deficit for long period of time. A recent Japanese long-term study of a very large cohort extracted from 4-year long insurance records showed that BF skippers had a lower incidence of metabolic diseases, which constitute risk factors for diseases of aging. Reducing these risk factors can provide protection against early onset of aging and prolong healthy, active and happy aging.<br><br>Prolonging the overnight fast habitually happens on a daily basis during the time-restricted feeding regimen (TRF). In animal studies, TRF protocols restrict food availability to 4–8 hour every circadian cycle (e.g. during dark phase in rodents). Animal studies have shown that metabolic consequences of TRF are metabolically favorable independently of caloric intakes. Even a short-term TRF intervention in adult rats slowed down age-associated cognitive decline and improved cognitive functions (Singh et al., 2012). The effects on glucose tolerance and insulin sensitivity were more pronounced compared to caloric restriction.<br>In humans, TRF is achieved by consistently reducing daily meal count. Similarly, TRF has been shown to be as metabolically favorable in humans showing long-term neuroprotective effects, e.g., in the prevention of neurodegenerative diseases (Jadiya et al., 2011; Srivastava &amp; Haigis, 2011),  supposedly via improving synaptic plasticity and cognitive function (Fontán-Lozano et al., 2008;  Liu et al., 2013). TRF is a one of the forms of Intermittent fasting , the one with superior adherence. A recent Japanese long-term study of a very large cohort extracted from 4-year long insurance records showed that BF skippers had a lower incidence of metabolic diseases, which constitute risk factors for diseases of aging. A recent Japanese long-term study of a very large cohort extracted from 4-year long insurance records showed that BF skippers had a lower incidence of metabolic diseases, which constitute risk factors for diseases of aging. Reducing these risk factors can provide protection against early onset of aging and prolong healthy, active and happy aging (Okamoto et al., 2013)<br><br>In a 4-year long study based on Japanese insurance statistics, the accumulation of newly diagnosed diseases was plotted against various lifestyle-related behaviors (Okamoto et al., 2013). Self-reported BF-skippers had a lower incidence of all diseases (including metabolic diseases) as compared to BF-eaters (Fig. A and B). In the same study, a link between late eating and poorer health was demonstrated (Fig. C). Skipping BF may provide the neuroprotective and cognitively beneficial effects similar to that of TRF (Zilberter &amp; Zilberter, 2014) and thus promote the healthy cognitive aging. Our detailed analysis of BF eating versus BF skipping effects revealed that only the only group benefiting from any BF is malnourished children and children with low IQs. Children having high IQ showed better cognitive test results after skipped BF. The most important finding are: 1) habitual BF-skipping adult perform better without BF and 2) habitual BF eater perform better after BF of pure fat, which means that their overnight ketosis state is not interrupted.<br><br>Sleeping energy expenditure was higher when BF was habitually skipped indicating a prolongation of overnight ketosis (Kobayashi et al., 2014). Indeed, the best cognitive performance was observed after a BF of pure fat (Fischer et al., 2001), which may metabolically mimic the effects of skipping BF altogether by the same token as the ketogenic diet mimics the effects of starvation. Long-term effects of ketosis are known to be strongly neuroprotective and cognitively beneficial, for instance in children and in studies of Alzheimer's disease (Zilberter &amp; Zilberter, 2013).<br><br>References<br>1. Betts et al. Proceedings of the Nutrition Society (2016) 1-11.<br>2. Brown et al. Am J Clin Nutr (2013) 98(5):1298–308. doi:10.3945/ajcn.113.064410<br>3. Fontán-L ozano et al. (2008). Mol. Neurobiol.38, 167–177. doi: 10.1007/s12035-008-8040-1<br>4. Gonzalez et al. Br J Nutr(2013) 110 :1–12<br>5. Jadiya et al. (2011). Biochem. Biophys. Res. Commun. 413, 306–310<br>6. Kobayashi et al. Obes Res Clin Pract(2013) 8 (3):e249–e257. doi:10.1016/j.orcp.2013.01.001<br>7. Levitsky &amp; Pacanowski Physiol Behav (2013) 119 :9–16.<br>8. 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