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Stuart Phillips (he/him) Profile picture
@mackinprof
Feb 26, 2024 • 11 tweets • 3 min read • Read on X
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Recently an article got everyone's knickers in a twist about protein and CVD. Here's an easy to read summary of the paper with my pictorial essay medicalnewstoday.com/articles/eatin…
Note: this is a conclusion from mice only... it's translation to humans... 🧐 Image
High protein diets may contribute (!!) but we should revise dietary guidelines (???) In our 2020 paper also in mice 🐭 🤨 Image
We created diets in mice that mimicked what people are - at the highest end of intake... Image
Part I - 14 people! Part II - 9 people. Leucine - no reference or data 'cept for a 2020 paper in? You guessed it 🐁 😉

Activates a pathway in immune cells that's ASSociated with atherosclerosis... 🤔 Image
Now we 'pin down' the reason - now it's causal (??) Leu is the 'bad actor' 🫤 (in mice anyway and 22% is the magic threshold) Image
2020 study in 🐁🐭
Another dude thinks this is not a big deal (I'd agree)

Takeaway... 23 people and acute immune cell signalling
Mice and 22% protein that 'mimics' the higher end of what humans ingest
It's only Leu... Image
Time to have a hard think about what the science is and the message being pushed. The data are mildly interesting and give some food for thought. I stop (well) short of seeing this as a smoking (protein-filled) fun and the reason to change dietary guidance OR to issue a per meal or dietary threshold advice to people.

I note the absence of a disease incidence, or risk or any causative data in humans...

Carry on folks: exercise, fuel to meet your needs, enjoy time with friends, lower your stress, have purpose in life and you will live well

Also, don't drink Boost with more protein on top... and stop feeding your mouse >22% protein! 😉
Just appreciate the limitations of the data and the model and the design and the ex-vivo outcomes and the murine model before we blow the horn for protein 'causes' CVD (or even increases risk). Also #Science
sciencemediacentre.org/expert-reactio…
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More from @mackinprof

Stuart Phillips (he/him) Profile picture
Jan 27
🧵 Epidemiology: its uses, abuses, and limits, especially in exercise & lifestyle research

1/
 Statement “epi is useless,” especially after high-profile lifestyle studies with implausible effect sizes or overfit curves. Frustration is understandable; the conclusion is too blunt.
2/
 Epidemiology is fundamentally descriptive, not magical.
It’s very good at answering “what tends to travel together?”
It is much worse at answering “what should you do?”
3/
 Where epi works well:
• Identifying large, consistent signals (e.g., smoking, inactivity)
• Flagging inequities and population-level patterns
• Generating hypotheses worth testing more rigorously
Read 13 tweets
Stuart Phillips (he/him) Profile picture
Jan 19
1/ NEED vs SUFFICIENT: why this lifting debate misses the point.

There’s a big difference between what is needed and what is sufficient for muscle and strength adaptations. Confusing the two is where gym arguments go off the rails.

Thanks @foundmyfitness for reigniting 😂
2/ The simple truth: nothing is strictly needed in terms of load, rep range, or lifting style to gain muscle or strength.

Heavier loads work.
Lighter loads work.
Both are sufficient when training is done well.
bjsm.bmj.com/content/57/18/…
3/ Same story for health.

Resistance training improves health across a wide range of loading schemes. There is no “magic” zone you must (need to) train in to get benefits.

journals.lww.com/acsm-healthfit…
Read 19 tweets
Stuart Phillips (he/him) Profile picture
Dec 31, 2025
We show (again) that: Resistance training load does not determine resistance training‐induced hypertrophy across upper and lower limbs in healthy young males physoc.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1113/JP…
New paper in The Journal of Physiology:
Resistance training load does NOT determine hypertrophy when effort is matched.
Heavier ≠ better for muscle growth. 🧵👇
2/
 20 young men trained their arms and legs unilaterally for 10 weeks.
• One limb: heavy load (70–80% 1RM, 8–12 reps)
• Other limb: light load (30–40% 1RM, 20–25 reps)
All sets to volitional fatigue.
Read 12 tweets
Stuart Phillips (he/him) Profile picture
Nov 2, 2025
To be clear, the 27% added is lean mass, that's not muscle mass, and that added mass is 300g (less than a pound). So I think @fmfclips that I don't mean to be disingenuous, but @PeterAttiaMD's take on 'how much' protein is good is overblown!
I've spent 30 years working in this area, and we've generated lots (and lots) of data on protein requirements and hypertrophy-related requirements. The RDA isn't cutting it, but anything beyond 1.6 is a total waste of time (and money).
Many are having a heyday preaching BIG protein without data, nuance, or understanding of basic principles. I'd invite @BioLayne, @foundmyfitness, @PeterAttiaMD, @hubermanlab to sit down and have a REAL discussion about protein and muscle anytime!
Read 5 tweets
Stuart Phillips (he/him) Profile picture
Aug 21, 2025
Sometimes even the bigs get it wrong Image
In 2014, a Cell Metabolism paper claimed high protein intakes (50–65 y) ↑ mortality by 75% & ↑ cancer mortality 4-fold! Headlines screamed: “Protein as bad as smoking.” 🔗 a 🧵cell.com/cell-metabolis…
Our team of protein researchers saw major flaws in that NHANES analysis. We wrote a letter to the editor—it was never published. Thanks to @biolayne, it’s still alive.
🔗 biolayne.com/blog/broscienc…
Read 10 tweets
Stuart Phillips (he/him) Profile picture
Oct 29, 2024
When analyzed, women gain the same relative amount of lean mass (and presumably muscle) and strength as men
sportrxiv.org/index.php/serv…
pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32218059/

So why all the fuss over T (total or free), as a causative factor in RT-induced hypertrophy?
Hormones, Hypertrophy, and Hype: An Evidence-Guided Primer on Endogenous Endocrine Influences on Exercise-Induced Muscle Hypertrophy

great work y @AlyshaDSouza1 and @vanevery93journals.lww.com/acsm-essr/full…
In short, mechanisms of hypertrophy are mostly internally driven intrinsic to the muscle itself Thanks @DrMikeRoberts

Short-term acute rises and menstrual cycle phase-based changes in hormones are not consequential to RT-induced hypertrophy.journals.physiology.org/doi/full/10.11…
Read 6 tweets

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