Article
Does cutting carbs raise your metabolic rate?
Does cutting carbs raise your metabolic rate? What the controlled feeding trials and meta-analyses of the carbohydrate-insulin model actually found.
Human metabolism, measured rather than asserted
Almost everything popularly believed about "slow metabolism" is measurable, and most of it has been measured. The results are not what the wellness industry implies.
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Does a low-carb diet burn more calories?
The metabolic advantage claim, tested: what the reanalysis of 29 controlled feeding trials and the energy-expenditure studies say about low-carb diets.
The four things worth knowing
Measurement
How energy expenditure is actually measured
Doubly labelled water is the reference method, and it shows far less between-person variation than folklore predicts.
Adaptation
Does dieting damage your metabolism?
Adaptive thermogenesis is real and much smaller than the internet claims. A systematic review put a number on it.
Pathophysiology
Insulin resistance, mechanistically
What it is, what causes it, and why the popular carbohydrate story is incomplete.
Devices
Do CGMs tell healthy people anything?
Glucose variability in people without diabetes, and what a spike does and does not mean.
Thermogenesis
Brown fat and cold exposure
Genuinely fascinating physiology, and a very small contributor to human energy balance.
Tracking
Why calorie trackers disagree
Validity of dietary assessment against doubly labelled water — the error bars are enormous.
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GLP-1 Evidence
What the trials actually show about semaglutide, tirzepatide and the rest of the GLP-1 class.
Fasting Evidence
Intermittent fasting, time-restricted eating and meal timing, judged on the trial data.
Weight Loss Evidence
Diets, drugs, behaviour and maintenance — ranked by the strength of the evidence behind them.
Sleep Evidence
Sleep, circadian rhythm and the wearables that claim to measure both.