4 rules will help maintain and build muscle at any age

In his laboratory, Professor van Loon is testing different supplements and exercises to build muscle, as well as studying the mechanisms of atrophy - muscle loss. Based on data from its research and other scientific work in this area, you can display four important rules about the growth of muscles.

1. Your muscles are built from what you eat

Surely you've heard that to build muscles need protein. In 2009, Professor van Loon workedThe production of intrinsically labeled milk protein provides a functional tool for human nutrition research a special technique to determine the amino acids - the components of protein - are part of our body.

To this end, the cows give special labeled amino acids, milked them and isolated from milk casein - one of the major proteins found in milk products. Then give the person casein and periodically take his blood samples and muscle tissue biopsy, to trace the entire path of the amino acids from the digestive tract to the blood and muscles.

With this method, the scientists have discoveredPost-Prandial Protein Handling: You Are What You Just AteThat within half an hour after taking 20 g of 55% casein amino acids were in the bloodstream. About 20% of them were in the skeletal muscle tissue and stimulate their growth. Within five hours after receiving 11% protein amino acids become part of the muscle.

2. Matter how much protein you eat, and when to do it

Amino acids from the protein plays a dual role in muscle building: provide the building material and serves anabolic signal "Time to grow up!". The latest deals amino acid leucine. It is indispensable: our body does not synthesize it. Therefore, the amino acid should come from food, moreover, in sufficient quantity. Ideally, each dose should proteinInternational Society of Sports Nutrition Position Stand: protein and exercise 700-3 contain 000 milligrams of leucine.

But one for leucine muscle growth enough. We need all the amino acids, moreover, in a certain amount. scientists have foundProtein ingestion to stimulate myofibrillar protein synthesis requires greater relative protein intakes in healthy older versus younger men perfect dose of protein, which will cause the muscles to grow at maximum speed:

Each meal should contain 0.25 g of protein per 1 kg of body weight of young people and 0.40 g of protein per 1 kg of body weight for the elderly.

As a general rule, to preserve and build muscle advised to consumeInternational Society of Sports Nutrition Position Stand: protein and exercise 1.4-2 g of protein per kg of body weight per day. In a recent surveyA systematic review, meta-analysis and meta-regression of the effect of protein supplementation on resistance training-induced gains in muscle mass and strength in healthy adults scientific papers, scientists have named a more accurate amount when entering whose protein synthesis is accelerated up to the limit, - 1.62 g / kg body weight per day.

Of course, you can not eat it all at once. Daily norm of the protein to be divided into equal parts (at 0.25 g / kg body weight) according to the amount of food intake. For example, if you need to eat 130 grams of protein a day (to 80 kg), you can divide it into six parts, and every three hours to make 20 g, and before bedtime - '30

At night, it is necessary to eat more. another studyThe Impact of Pre-sleep Protein Ingestion on the Skeletal Muscle Adaptive Response to Exercise in Humans: An Update involving van Luna showed that 30-40 g of casein bedtime increases muscle protein synthesis, and the minimal amount of protein does not have such an effect.

3. Protein is powerless without movement

With age muscle mass starts to leave. After 30 years, man loses 3-8% of muscle per decade, and to keep their muscles, it is necessary to consume more protein. However, it is not just age-related changes of the body, but in a person's lifestyle.

The study showedProtecting muscle mass and function in older adults during bed restThe muscles in the elderly go nonlinearly. They do not just fade out, and make it jumps - it is in those periods when a person aged comply with bed rest during an illness. In such moments of the muscles out and not come back.

Immobility It kills the muscles and the youth. In one experiment,One Week of Bed Rest Leads to Substantial Muscle Atrophy and Induces Whole-Body Insulin Resistance in the Absence of Skeletal Muscle Lipid Accumulation a week of strict bed rest, young people have lost 1.4 kg of muscle mass. To increase the amount it is, you need toIncreasing Lean Mass and Strength: A Comparison of High Frequency Strength Training to Lower Frequency Strength Training more than eight weeks of regular strength training.

In another experiment,Neuromuscular electrical stimulation prevents muscle disuse atrophy during leg immobilization in humans van Loon found that complete immobility during the five days of the muscle decreases by 3.5%, and its force - 9%. But if you stimulate the same muscle electrical impulses, the loss is greatly reduced or absent. Electrical stimulation helps even patients in a comaNeuromuscular electrical stimulation prevents muscle wasting in critically ill comatose patients: It decreases protein breakdown and prevents muscle atrophy.

Without training the muscles do not grow without movement - all are melting at a rapid rate.

Without traffic no protein will not help you keep your muscle mass, and with strength training can do it at any age. And another studyProtein supplementation increases muscle mass gain during prolonged resistance-type exercise training in frail elderly people: a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial The moon is confirmed: six months of strength training twice a week, older people far 70 have increased 1.3 kg of lean muscle mass.

4. Thorough chewing - the key to success

If you get protein from food rather than in the form of powderIt makes sense to thoroughly chew it. Thus, the studyMinced beef is more rapidly digested and absorbed than beef steak, resulting in greater postprandial protein retention in older men showed that after consuming ground beef percentage of amino acids in the blood increases faster than after the steak with the same amount of protein. Further, within six hours after eating stuffing amino acid levels in the blood was 61%, and in the case of a steak - only 49%.

Scientists have found no difference in protein synthesis, but perhaps it was because the muscle biopsies It took only six hours after eating, and accelerated synthesis occurs, usually 1-2 hours.

It is logical to assume that if the muscles get more building material and stimulus for growth, they will grow faster. Although probably figure it can only further investigation.

In any case, thorough chewing is useful for digestionChewing Your Food: Is 32 Really the Magic Number? as a whole, so you have nothing to lose by spending a few extra minutes on the absorption of your steak or breasts.